


A Broken Man & The Dawn

by n_nami



Category: CW RPS, Supernatural RPF
Genre: Angst, Depression, Hurt/Comfort, Kid!Fic, M/M, Minor Character Death, Romance, daddy!Jensen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-09-24
Updated: 2013-12-29
Packaged: 2017-12-27 13:15:34
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 9
Words: 44,518
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/979369
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/n_nami/pseuds/n_nami
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After his brother dies in a car accident, Jensen is left to take care of his newborn nephew - and he’s in over his head. Also, he has the feeling that the guy who just moved into the apartment next door hates him because of the crying baby that keeps him up all night. As it turns out, Misha not only has that set of mesmerizing blue eyes, but also a lot of intuition when it comes to fussing, cranky babies.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> So I wanted to write a slow burn, angsty Cockles kid!fic, and this is the result. It's immensely fun to do this outside of a challenge for once, and I promise regular updates on this – expect them every other week.
> 
> The masterpost for this story is crossposted on my LJ [here](http://namichan89.livejournal.com/29885.html).
> 
>  **Special thanks:**  
>  To the lovely [winjennster](http://winjennster.tumblr.com), who volunteered to beta this story. This wouldn't be possible without you!
> 
> To the awesome [petite-madame](http://petite-madame.livejournal.com) who drew this amazing banner for me, even though she's got enough to worry about without me begging for artwork outside of challenges.
> 
> To the tumblr-based Cockles shipping circle, consisting of these lovely ladies: [caswouldratherbehere](http://caswouldratherbehere.tumblr.com), [supermishamiga](http://supermishamiga.tumblr.com) and [amaelangel](http://amaelangel.tumblr.com).
> 
> Thank you all so much for your consistent support! <3

It took exactly one phone call for Jensen Ackles to have his life turned upside down.

One phone call, one drive to the local hospital during which he almost ran three red lights and skidded to an abrupt halt on the icy road twice, until he finally wrapped his sister in his arms. She seemed so calm and collected, eyes expressionless and blank as she clutched her cell phone to her chest. However, as soon as she rested her chin on Jensen's shoulder, she broke down into tears. Jensen was still caught in the daze that had followed him all the way to the hospital and tugged his sister in, quietly soothing her by stroking his hand through her long, but now disheveled hair.

"Why is this happening," she sobbed, the wetness of her tears making Jensen's shirt cling to his already sweaty skin. "This isn't fair, this isn't-- Jay--"

"Shh," Jensen hushed.

He couldn't cry.

In that moment, he had to be strong for his little sister. He couldn't allow himself to break down, too. She needed him. She needed her big brother, because he was the only one she still had.

Josh laid in the room behind them, the doctors storming in and out of it, every one of them looking down at the floor or at their clipboard and avoiding Jensen's or Mackenzie's questioning gazes. A drunk driver, they said, who lost control over his pick-up truck on the highway and hit Josh's car, driving them off the road and into a tree. The car was totaled, but worse still, Josh and his wife were gravely injured.

"Mom and Dad, and now Josh? It's not fair," Mackenzie repeated, choking on her tears and coughing.

"Mack, I'm here," Jensen said quietly. "We're gonna- we've still got each other."

Someone cleared their throat beside them, and Jensen looked up to find a middle-aged doctor with salt-and-pepper hair watching them with a worried frown. "Miss Ackles, Mister Ackles?"

"Yes? Any news?" Jensen burst out.

"Yes, it's... I’m sorry to have to tell you this, but we couldn’t do anything else for him."

Jensen stared at him, unable to form a single thought, and bit down on his lip to stop it from trembling. In his arms, Mack twisted and buried her face in his neck as a new wave of sobs shook her body.

"What about Mary-Anne?" Jensen asked flatly. He was afraid that if he gave into the pain that was making his chest tighten and his heart clench impossibly, he wouldn't be able to hold himself together anymore.

"Her internal organs were too damaged. She didn't survive the surgery," the doctor answered in a quiet tone, obviously affected by the devastating news, too. "I'm sorry for your loss," he added.

Leaning down, Jensen held on tight to his little sister, buried his nose in her blonde hair, needing to feel that she was still there, still alive.

The doctor - _Henry Thompson, MD,_ the sign on his coat said - shuffled his feet. "The baby is alive and healthy, though."

Jensen nodded and took a deep breath. His analytically-trained brain kicked into high gear, numbing the searing feelings scorching his insides, setting priorities that he wasn't consciously aware of - but he knew, with surprising clarity, that he needed to take care of the people he still had in his life first. That meant Mackenzie, and that meant the baby. Mary-Anne's and Josh's baby, whose due date would've been a mere three weeks away.

"Do you want to see it?"

"Of course," Jensen answered automatically, irritated.

"I just thought, if you want to put it up for adoption, you might not want to get attached," Dr. Thompson advised cautiously.

However, that made Jensen perk up. "We're not putting it up for adoption," he decided, his voice as firm as he could manage. The poor baby had no fault in this, and as long as there was family to take care of it, he would not sign anything that left the child to the foster care system.

"Jay," his sister untangled herself from his arms to take a step back. "What are we going to do? You've got a job, I've got college."

"Yeah, but I-" Jensen broke off, let the sentence remain unfinished for a second. He thought of his job as an engineer which he'd been working in for 5 years now, and left it at, "I'll deal with it. There's people in worse situations than mine who take care of a child."

"You sure?"

"It's Josh's kid. Of course I'm sure," Jensen stated, and there was not a doubt in his mind in that moment.

"So. Please follow me, then," the doctor interrupted them and lead the way when both Jensen and Mackenzie nodded.

Not five minutes later and two floors higher, Jensen was handed a small, white bundle with a reddened, squishy and very sleepy face peeking out. The baby seemed so fragile, so delicate. Its tiny hands clenched into fists that barely fit around Jensen’s thumb when he took the baby’s hand in his.

"Boy or girl?" Jensen asked the nurse.

"Boy," she answered with a soft smile at the newborn in Jensen's arms.

Mackenzie looked over Jensen's shoulder, her eyes still red-rimmed and glassy, but inevitably lighting up at seeing the little boy. "Hey there, little one," she said softly, stroking his cheek with her index finger.

The touch made him blink and yawn adorably, and Jensen knew that he had just lost his heart then and there. There was no way that he would not raise this kid. "Josh and Mary-Ann didn't have a boy name, did they?" he asked absentmindedly, without averting his gaze.

"No. Molly or Andrea, they said."

"Guess that makes him an Andrew, then. Andrew Joshua, how about that?" Jensen mumbled, lost in thought, the question directed more at himself than to anyone in the room.

"Andy. AJ. AJ Ackles," Mackenzie summed it up. "I like it."

"Welcome to the world, AJ," Jensen greeted the little boy, still too hesitant to cuddle him firmly to his chest, no matter how much he wanted to. This was his brother's legacy, the boy was all they had left of him.

And Jensen would damn well take care of him.

***

The following week flew by in what seemed like a second. Mackenzie managed to get that week off from college, and Jensen took three days off after negotiating with his boss to get his paternity leave.

Within those few days, Jensen had to repeat the painful story of how he suddenly was the guardian of a newborn baby several times, and by the third time, he could sum it up, emotionless, within two sentences. Some people eyed him with pity and sympathy in their eyes, some with irritation at his bluntness about the matter. But the truth was, Jensen felt hollow and empty, and there were a thousand things to take care of at the moment. He needed his head in the game, and Mackenzie could only do so much, although she tried.

To be assigned as the boy's guardian was a mere act of minutes in front of the family court, since Mary-Ann had no closer family as a single child with both parents having died years ago. Jensen, having a home and a steady job, didn't even need to convince the judge of his ability to care for a child.

Since AJ had been born under severely different circumstances than usual and around three weeks too soon, the hospital kept him for observation purposes for another week. Jensen stopped by the hospital whenever he could, at least once a day, to see the baby boy who was mostly asleep during his visits. Luckily, he was doing fine, no after-effects of the surgery or the accident affecting his development.

The hardest part, by far, was going over to his brother's house.

When Jensen opened the door, he more than once expected to see Josh rounding the corner from the kitchen, eyeing him with surprise and then insulting him for not using the doorbell like a normal visitor would. But Josh never came and the house stayed eerily quiet, Jensen's footfalls the only sound following him down the hallway.

The living room especially seemed even quieter than the rest of the house. Not too long ago, it was the one room where there was always noise, from the people living there, from the TV, from the dog that Jensen had to give to one of Josh's neighbors with a heavy heart because pets weren't allowed in his condo building. Now, dust began to settle on the surfaces around, without Mary-Anne cleaning them up, and the room felt cold. Not because Jensen hadn't turned up the heating – for whom? - but because it felt empty. There would be no poker nights in here anymore. There wouldn't be Josh, pushing beer after beer into Jensen's hand until he passed out on the couch, or Mary-Anne to throw a quilt over him once he slept.

It felt so surreal, Jensen still couldn't believe it.

When Jensen wasn't imagining spotting his brother somewhere, he thought that the house looked like they just were on holiday. Like those three weeks they had spent in Europe last year, where Jensen had to stop by every three days to water the plants.

And the nursery. They had painted the walls a light, mellow green only three months ago, and among the white furniture sat a crib in the middle of the room. A crib that Jensen had helped to build. Jensen could almost see Josh walking in here in the middle of the night, calming the fussing baby, or Mary-Anne singing a lullaby in the evening until it fell asleep.

It seemed like it would happen every day.

Mack had cried for ten minutes straight that first time they entered the house. Jensen had just shut down a little bit more and blindly started to pack up the furniture and general baby-related stuff from the nursery. They had to drive his truck across town three times until they had collected it all – the crib, the toys, the milk substitute, the bottles, the mobile hanging from the nursery's ceiling.

At Jensen's condo, Mackenzie and him emptied the former guest room and used what little of the green paint was left to decorate the walls in hand-drawn flowers and clouds. Jensen supposed that it was part of Mack's coping mechanism, because she honest to God hummed to herself at the end of that day.

But, no, coping wasn't for him.

Jensen finished up work at the company, Mackenzie returned to college more or less straight from the funeral (“Take care of yourself and the little one, you hear me? Call me if you need anything, I'll do what I can.”) and Jensen drove by the hospital on his way home.

AJ seemed to recognize him somewhat, at least judging by the way his little arms wrapped around Jensen's hand, and by the way his eyes didn't leave Jensen's for a second throughout being strapped into his car seat.

Finally, Jensen sat at home, on his couch, with the little, sleeping human bundle sprawled out on his chest, and stared into space.

In some part of his still confused mind, Jensen wondered when Josh would stop by to pick AJ up, thanking Jensen for babysitting him.

That was the moment where he realized that it wasn't going to happen, because just an hour ago, he had seen the coffins of AJ's parents being lowered into the ground, and had dropped his obligatory shovelful of grave compost onto each of them.

And that was also the moment where Jensen allowed himself to let go. As a whimper wretched its way out of his trembling lips, he held AJ as close as he dared, until the little boy woke up and – feeling Jensen's own discomfort and agony – started to cry from the top of his lungs. For just a second, Jensen was thankful for the reminder that the baby was still there, still his responsibility, but for the next few moments, he watched until the boy's face became red like a tomato from screaming, and wanted nothing more than to attune to his keening.

Instead, Jensen pulled his act together, and prepared a bottle for the baby, careful to not let any tears that were still streaming down his face drop into the milk formula.

He had no idea how he was going to make it through this. Just that he owed it to AJ to make it.

***

In what little time Jensen had to deal with the idea of having to care for a baby any time soon – not that he ever thought he would have to – there was not a spare second left to read the books on caring for newborns that Mackenzie had brought home from the library the other day. Jensen knew the basics from a ten minute Google search, and he had common sense, and so he made it up as he went if he needed to. Which was more often than he liked.

Still, when AJ had cried his way through the third night since Jensen brought him home and Jensen had barely been able to sleep, much less do anything like clean the apartment or go grocery shopping, he almost lost his mind. The sleep deprivation made him impatient and cranky, but AJ didn't care about that. He sure as hell couldn't tell what his problem was either, so Jensen spent the first couple weeks guessing and diaper-changing and feeding probably unnecessarily often, and falling into despair about it.

Every mother he met on the street appeared to have a well-behaved, always sleeping, perfectly calm baby. And the second Jensen put AJ to bed at night, he would begin to scream, no matter how many times Jensen checked that nothing was wrong with his room, his crib, his quilt or anything in his near proximity.

That, and Jensen himself looked like shit, but who the hell cared about him? Everything was about the baby these days. His neighbors downstairs only put up with the screaming through the night because whenever he met them in the hallway, Jessie would coo to AJ and he would be a perfect angel about it. Her boyfriend eyed Jensen warily, for whatever reason. Jensen couldn't care less.

Four weeks after Jensen adopted AJ – and he had worked his way up to four times a week where Jensen wouldn't be able to get any shut-eye – he confessed to Dr. Padalecki, AJ's pediatrician, just how frayed his nerves truly were.

“Don't worry, Jensen,” the man with the floppy brown hair and the soft hazel eyes said. “First of all, it's quite normal for his age. I checked, he's doing completely fine, physically. Nothing that would indicate a reason for his screaming. It usually gets better when he's around three months old-”

Jensen groaned, buried his face in both hands and didn't move for a second, not even when he heard the quiet steps of the doctor approaching him. Three months? He had barely made it through the first one.

“Second,” the doctor added, and Jensen felt the warm weight of a big palm settling on his shoulder, squeezing gently, “The calmer the parent, the calmer the child. You're doing an amazing job, especially considering what you've been through, and I have no doubt about that. But the child feels when you're unsure or uneasy about it. Try to be more confident, I know you have it in you. And, like I said, it'll pass.”

Jensen finally dropped his hands from his face and looked up, noticing once again that Dr. Padalecki was one of the few people who managed to be taller than him. He was also stupidly gorgeous and had the most adorable grin in existence, and in another life, like the one Jensen had not two months ago, he would've hit that so hard that the doctor would've forgot his own name. Well, until Jensen noticed the golden wedding band on his left ring finger.

Still, that part of his life was deep-frozen for now, so Jensen wasn't too heart-broken about his pediatrician's obvious heterosexuality. He could deal, he had bigger things to worry about anyway.

So he nodded, a bit shyly. “Thank you.”

“Hang in there,” and with one last squeeze, the doctor let his hand slip from Jensen's shoulder.

“Thanks, Dr. Padalecki,” Jensen said again, moving to put AJ back in his baby carrier.

“Jared.”

“Excuse me?”

“My name's Jared,” the doctor offered with an open smile. “I don't have any single fathers around here and on top of that, you're older than me. So, it's okay. You're the exception.”

“Okay, then,” Jensen nodded and returned the smile stiffly. He worked in silence, and when AJ was all bundled up and ready to leave, he tipped his head at the pediatrician. “Jared,” he mumbled as a matter of goodbye.

“Take care, Jensen. I'll see you in two weeks for AJ's shots.”

***

When Jensen came home that day, he noticed a moving van out in front of the apartment building. It wasn't a common sight, since the majority of people living in this building had been here for years, and they were a small community of only twelve parties on six floors. Only the condo across the hall from Jensen's had recently been unoccupied after good old Mrs. Humphrey had died half a year ago. Why it took so long to get the apartment sold, Jensen had no idea, but knowing her grandchildren they probably had an inheritance dispute.

The moving van was a generic U-haul with no company markings, and Jensen didn't pay it a second glance before moving his car to the underground garage.

With AJ sleeping in his baby carrier, he took the stairs to the first floor and picked up his mail before heading towards the elevator. Blindly, Jensen hit the button to call it and waited, mentally still stuck on Dr. Padalecki's – Jared's - words.

“Elevator's busted,” a voice behind him grunted, effectively throwing Jensen off his train of thought.

Jensen whipped his head around, just to find a man with dark, unruly hair and piercing blue eyes heaving a bookshelf through the door. Without a second guess, Jensen put AJ down on the floor to hold the door for him, still trying to find the right thing to say. Was this the guy moving in or just one of his buddies helping out? Because damn, if that was the guy living across the hall from him now, then Jensen had more problems than just a cranky baby to care for.

“Um,” he managed as he watched the man put the piece of furniture on the floor, his simple black t-shirt riding up to reveal delicate hipbones. Well. The guy took a few deep breaths and only looked at Jensen a second time a moment later.

“Hey, I'm Misha,” he introduced himself and held his hand out for Jensen to shake.

“Jensen,” he answered, shaking the offered hand and wondering only for a second about the other man's unusual name. It's not like his own was any more common.

They shared a quick smile, and Jensen realized how little he actually had smiled during the past month. His lips felt stiff, the movement rusty.

“Did you get hold of the janitor yet? He'll know what to do with the elevator,” Jensen nodded towards the unmoving sliding doors.

“Yeah, I did. It's just... I need to get the truck unloaded and back by tonight, and the broken elevator is kind of inconvenient,” Misha squinted, then rolled his shoulders before picking up the shelf again and heading upstairs.

Jensen looked over his shoulder, checking if someone else would come in with more furniture. “Don't you have anyone to help you?”

Misha just huffed a bitter laugh. “It's just me.”

“You moving into 4 B?” Jensen asked, taking AJ and following him.

“Yes?”

“Ah,” Jensen nodded, although Misha wasn't able to see it.

“Ah?”

“Um, that's the one across the hall from my apartment.”

“Ah. Well, howdy neighbor.”

“Uh, hi,” Jensen said, and Misha's light tone actually made him chuckle silently.

They didn't say much for the rest of the way, since Misha quickly was too out of breath and Jensen didn't know what to say.

By the time Jensen unlocked the door to his condo, though, he had made up his mind. “Hey, if you need some help, it's not like I've got much more to do than change diapers for the rest of the day,” he offered.

“That would actually make you the savior of my day,” Misha answered, lips spreading into a grin.

Only now did Jensen notice how plush and full they were, slightly chapped and yet soft-looking, and he kind of-

No.

He had no time for this.

“Well, then, I'll gladly save your day. I'll just need a minute taking care of-” he broke off when he noticed that AJ was looking at him with his blue eyes wide open, watching silently. He had gotten so used to AJ screaming his lungs out at each and every little thing that bugged him that it was a pleasant surprise.

“Oh, I'm sorry,” Misha's voice dropped to a soft, cooing tone as he took a step towards them, his eyes on the baby as Jensen unstrapped him and lifted him into the crook of his arm. “I didn't even say hello to the little lady. What's her name?”

“She's a He, actually. They... they thought he'd be a girl, so most of the stuff I have for him is pink. But, um... his name is AJ.”

“AJ,” Misha repeated, “Hi there, little man.” Then he locked eyes with the little boy in Jensen's arms, who, after a short second, extended a hand, making grabby motions at the stranger. “May I?” he added.

“Go ahead,” Jensen nodded, too mesmerized by the fact that Misha and AJ shared the same, baby blue eye color.

A tiny fist closed around Misha's index finger, and AJ blinked a few times up at him before apparently losing interest and focusing back on Jensen.

“He's adorable. Yours?”

And yes, Jensen had dreaded that question, because it would come up sooner or later. Now and the next couple decades. “Not biologically. But I'm raising him.” That was enough to be said about it, the memories still too fresh for Jensen to deal with them. “I'll meet you out here in a minute?” Jensen added quickly to prevent further questions.

“Yeah, sure.”

AJ chose the exact moment when Jensen put him down on the changing table to break out into another crying fit, but it only spoke for Jensen's nerves that he made quick work of the diaper and had him shushed and calmed down within the next few minutes. After AJ was safely tucked in his crib, Jensen switched on the baby monitor and clipped the receiving unit to his belt.

“Alright, let's do this,” he clapped his hands when he saw Misha leaning against the door frame, a soft smile playing around the edges of his lips. The smile said more than Jensen wanted to think about right now, but mostly that Misha already knew there was a story to tell behind all this, and that he would get it out of Jensen one day.

***

By the end of the day, during which AJ had only interrupted Jensen once and was quickly satisfied by a bottle of milk, Jensen's arms were sore and he was more than exhausted. Sleep deprivation aside, he hadn't done anything remotely workout related – including sex – for at least a month, and he was rusty.

Misha only chuckled when Jensen groaned as they rolled out the futon mattress in what would be his bedroom soon.

“So I guess I really owe you one,” Misha said as an afterthought. “Thank you very much.”

His hair stuck up in messy spikes by now, because he apparently had an affinity for running his hands through it. One lock was curled onto his forehead, Superman-style, and on the back of his head, a single strand peaked out. Jensen caught himself at the thought that he'd love to smooth it down just to entangle his fingers in it, preferably during a blowjob. Or something.

“Don't worry about it,” Jensen waved it off. “Let's just... drink a beer or something together some day. To new neighbors and stuff. At home, though, I don't really have anyone watching AJ for me.”

“Sure thing,” Misha nodded, and the way he said it made Jensen listen more closely.

“You're not from Texas, are you?”

Misha shook his head and chuckled. “Not exactly. Try Massachusetts. Among others.”

Jensen shot him a slightly irritated glance, but didn't ask further. That sure was a story for another day, too. “I... see. So what brought you to Dallas?”

“The climate? I don't know, I just thought I'd give Dallas a try. So far, at least the company seems nice enough,” Misha answered with a playful wink at Jensen.

It was innocent enough, but it still made Jensen's stomach do a funny twist. It's not like Misha could know; they were in Texas after all and Jensen didn't exactly go around parading with a rainbow flag as his cape. And anyway, he didn't have time for this.

“Thanks, um. I guess I better get home and get the little one fed, huh?” Jensen tried to sound nonchalant, but apparently failed, judged by the smile dimming on Misha's lips.

“I'll see you around, then,” he nodded courtly, then accompanied Jensen to the door. “Good night, Jensen. Say good night to AJ, too.”

“Will do. Good night, Misha.”

And, yes, Jensen felt a little bit better that day, sore arms and legs notwithstanding. That was, until AJ's regular evening crying fit started. One of those where he wouldn't let himself get soothed from by Jensen.

So Jensen found himself sitting on the couch with a screaming, red-faced baby on his chest, wondering if Misha hated him already, since he knew AJ wouldn't stop for at least another hour or two. If Jensen was lucky. Which, during the last month, wasn't generally the case.

***

And AJ cried.

For the following three nights, to be exact, which had Jensen walking around like a zombie, and even contemplating sleeping through the day as much as he could. Which meant he got even less stuff done than usual, but he could only take so much.

When AJ woke during the fourth night with a wailing keen, Jensen rolled slowly out of bed and dragged his feet over to the nursery. The clock said 4 a.m., and Jensen was seriously pissed.

Not at AJ, not at all.

At the situation as a whole. At the unfairness of the universe taking away this poor kid's parents at a way too young age, at his own inability to care for AJ the way he wanted to. He did what he could, and he still ended up like this almost every night. No one had prepared him for this. Fuck, but Jensen wanted to punch his hand into the wall with an urgency that surprised him. It wasn't fair, not to him, not to AJ. Why couldn't he just have his life back, the one he gave up with taking in AJ? Why couldn't Josh and Mary-Anne have waited another two minutes before heading downtown on that stupid highway? Why couldn't AJ have a normal fucking life with a mom and dad and probably a little sister or brother instead of being raised by his uncle?

Jensen knew that these thoughts weren't fair either, and that life was the way it was and he had to fucking deal with it. Still, he couldn't help thinking, and he refused to feel guilty for it.

How often had he moaned about having to go to work and getting up early? How often had he damned life itself when he nursed a hangover on his couch, although he knew it was his own damned fault? How often had he felt lonely because his last relationship- well, no. He didn't go there on principle.

It all seemed so meager in the harsh light of the kitchen lamp with a crying baby sobbing into his shoulder. It was a miracle in itself that Jensen hadn't gotten any complaints from his cohabitants, most of all Misha, so far. They surely heard AJ's harsh cries, and still no one had commented on it.

He had seen Misha only twice since he moved in. Mostly, the sounds of him furnishing his apartment were the only thing Jensen noticed about him – the clank of tools, the scratch of something being pushed aside on the wooden floors, the cluttering of items being rummaged in and moved into cupboards and shelves. A metallic crash, that one time, that had AJ wake up and whining for an hour.

Jensen tested the temperature of the formula on his wrist and nodded to himself. Just about right.

Not even the bottle of milk could effectively calm the boy down. He sobbed and choked his way through drinking hungrily at the bottle, and Jensen’s heart clenched once again.

Not fair, all of it.

They shouldn't have to go through this.

The anger welled up again, and Jensen let it. Anger towards his brother for not driving a different route, for his wife always being the punctual one, anger towards the drunk driver and the stupid situation. They could all go fuck themselves.

Jensen let it smolder and burn in his chest, wallowing in the rage and anger and his own lack of power. The feelings consuming him were better to handle than the bottomless pit that was his heart during the past couple weeks. It made him feel alive, made him feel like there was still something worth living and fighting for – namely, AJ. The baby started to wail yet again, after having finished his bottle. Jensen sighed and mentally prepared himself for another two hours of having to listen to his screams. He couldn't stop it, he couldn't soothe the boy; all he could do was hold him in his arms and wait for the fit to be over. He didn't have the heart to put AJ down, his cries were too gut-wrenching for that. 

He had no idea how long he'd been walking around the apartment, rocking AJ in his arms, when someone rang the doorbell. Great, now the long-awaited complaint eventually trickled in.

When Jensen opened the door, it was to a sleepily blinking Misha in wide boxers and an old, threadbare t-shirt. “May I come in?” he mumbled around a yawn.

Jensen quickly waved him inside so that the boy wouldn't wake up the whole house by crying loudly in the hallway.

“Lemme guess, baby colic?”

“What now?” Jensen asked, his voice hoarse from not having talked in hours.

“Baby colic. Didn't your pediatrician tell you?”

Jensen huffed, barely able to keep his own eyes open. “Told me a damn lotta things, dude. Not like I'm an expert.”

Misha eyed him wearily, then opened his arms towards AJ. “Let me hold him?”

And, yeah, Jensen was kind of desperate at this point. So Misha might be a stranger, but Jensen knew where he lived and he was in his own apartment so he wouldn't get away with shit. All of this flashed through Jensen's mind in a split second, while he already held the wailing baby for Misha to take.

It wasn't like Misha had the golden touch or something, either, which felt kind of reassuring.

No, AJ cried for another half hour. But Misha rested him on the couch, softly cooed to the baby with patience Jensen had lost a week into this, and alternated soothing strokes with belly rubs. When the sobs started to get quieter, he asked Jensen for a triangular scarf, and Jensen handed him the one he usually used to carry AJ around in. He tucked AJ firmly into the cloth, and by the time Misha was finished, AJ's little eyes had already fallen closed.

Jensen watched it all closely, fascinated by the work of Misha's slim, dexterous fingers, and too sleepy and exhausted to even think about what else these fingers could probably do. He just smiled, relieved, when AJ finally rested in his crib, sound asleep.

“Thank you,” he sighed, deeply grateful, eyes finding Misha's behind him in the doorway.

Misha only nodded. “I might not have a job at the moment, but I do value my sleep. Also, you shouldn't do what I did just now too often, it restricts his movement. But sometimes it helps calm the baby down.”

“Again, thanks,” Jensen said groggily, so happy that this worked that he seriously contemplated kissing Misha right then and there. Kind of an overreaction, but probably worth it.

Misha gave him one last, tired smile, before he bid him good night and vanished back into his own apartment.

Surprisingly enough, AJ slept until 9 a.m. the next morning, and Jensen had the longest period of uninterrupted sleep in the last month and a half.

When he met Misha on his way to get the mail, covered in sweat from his morning run, Jensen didn't think twice before asking, “Wanna go for a cup of coffee later?”


	2. Chapter 2

"I like that you don't care about him wearing pink," Misha commented with a wide grin at AJ, resting in his stroller in a puffy, warm and very pink onesie. The blue beanie he wore was an addition of Jensen's that didn't even register against the overflow of pink. It wasn't a particularly cold January afternoon, especially not for Dallas, but Jensen wouldn't dare to dress him in too thin clothes.

In reply to Misha, he just shrugged and took a sip from his disposable Starbucks cup. Skinny latte, three shots of espresso, two pumps of sugar, just the way he liked it - which had for some reason been amusing to Misha. "Why would I care? It's not like he'd know the difference," Jensen answered with a small smile.

"My point exactly. But a lot of people would just sell the stuff and buy everything in blue instead."

Jensen chuckled. "Apart from the time and money involved, I really don't care if people think I'm turning him gay by letting him wear pink. This whole color-code for babies is ridiculous, anyway. If I would've had a say in all this, he would wear yellow and green."

"But... you didn't have a say in this?" Misha was fishing for information and he didn't even try to be subtle.

"No, I didn't," Jensen replied briskly. He didn't want to give said information and he, too, didn't try to be subtle about it. It still was too soon, he didn't even know the guy properly. "Also," he added to change the subject, "I'm secure enough in my masculinity to walk a violet stroller through the park."

At that, Misha snorted out laughing. "I noticed. And it's magenta, for the record."

Jensen raised an eyebrow at him and said nothing, only to have Misha's blue eyes find his and subsequently crinkle with suppressed laughter.

However, AJ decided to break that moment by squirming around in the stroller, giving off a series of unhappy whines as he woke up, and Jensen quickly stopped by a bench. Misha took the cup from his hand without asking or thinking twice, which had Jensen deliberately ignoring the brush of his fingers - delicate, but rough from all the work of the last days. AJ complained for a short minute in soft, mumbled baby noises that made Jensen smile. As it turned out, he wasn't in pain and didn’t have a full diaper, he just wanted Jensen's attention, wanted to be held. And wasn't that the easiest need to satisfy? Jensen held AJ close, and the little one dropped his head against Jensen's chest immediately. Jensen noticed that he'd been so on edge during the past weeks that he couldn't even enjoy these little moments with his foster son, those adorable moments that came with having a baby. Which was a shame.

Misha peeked over his shoulder, seeing as he barely was an inch shorter than Jensen, and screwed up his face a bit to distract AJ.

Which was, hands down, ten kinds of cute and had Jensen even more on the fence about wanting his old life back, where he could hit on Misha, versus this version where the other man was making an ass out of himself to amuse the kid.

It took another two minutes until AJ was quiet enough that Jensen said, "AJ, Imma put you back down now, and you're gonna be a man about it, okay?"

And AJ let him, watched him with bright, open eyes, until he was safely bundled up in his blanket and had his favorite toy in his hand - a Super Mario mushroom that Mackenzie had crocheted and sent to him two weeks ago. Only then did he seem to realize that they were out, in the park, and his eyes darted back and forth between trees and the lake and the people  
passing by, taking it all in.

When Jensen straightened back up to his full height, he found Misha looking at him cryptically. His eyes were unreadable, a small smirk playing around the edges of his lips as he handed the coffee cup back to Jensen.

"What?" Jensen asked.

"Nothing," Misha grinned and led the way down the path.

With a shake of his head, Jensen followed.

"So, by the way, what do you do for a living?"

Jensen deadpanned, "Well, I'm a stay-at-home dad, you know. Doesn't leave much time for anything else."

"Obviously," Misha rolled his eyes amused. "I meant, before you were a stay-at-home dad."

"Engineer. Went to UT, got my degree, and I’ve built cell phones ever since."

"Do you like it?"

"Yeah, the job is cool. The people at the company, too. They even let me have six months of paternity leave, although I think my boss only did it because he pities me," Jensen remarked bitterly.

"Why would he pity you?" Misha chased, taking the bait Jensen had so carelessly dropped.

He could manage the two-sentence sum-up, couldn’t he? Jensen hadn't talked about his situation after the funeral and everything with AJ was arranged. The people that needed to know why he was AJ's guardian already knew. And now... it got harder, talking about it. "AJ's my nephew. His parents aren't... you know. In the picture any more. So I take care of him."

"That's very admirable," Misha nods, smiling encouragingly. "Especially since you're on your own."

"Yeah well, I think it's better this way. Wouldn't want to pull anyone else into this, too."

Misha watched him carefully from the corner of his eyes and didn't say anything for a while. They walked down the path through the park in companionable silence, AJ too captivated by his surroundings to make a sound and Jensen found himself too lost in his own thoughts of how this should be Mary-Ann pushing the stroller and Josh walking beside her. Not him and Misha. Really, he shouldn't think so much about it, or it'll get too depressing soon.

Jensen tried to distract himself by focusing back on the man of his desires. "What about you? You said you didn't exactly have a job at the moment, so what do you usually do?"

"Oh, this and that," Misha shrugged, the smile returning to his lips. "Studied sociology, if that's what you mean, but I do whatever I want to. Voice-over work, translations, articles for the Morning News, stuff like that."

"Translations?"

"Yeah, I'm fluent in five languages. Including Tibetan."

"Tibetan?"

"Yeah, I spent about year over there," Misha said like it was no big deal.

Jensen raised both eyebrows in surprise. "Oh. Okay. So, you travel a lot?"

"Traveled a lot, yes. Now I'm back to good old US of A," Misha winked at him, which was so not fair.

Jensen quickly checked up on AJ to avoid Misha's eyes. "Well, I'd love to hear about that. Honestly, I never got further than a week in Vancouver.”

Misha dove right into tales of Tibet, of Asia in general, and his other travels all over the world. There was an anecdote to all of them, and Jensen almost felt his feet physically itch at most of them. 'Most of them' did not include India and the story of the rhesus monkey. He also had a lot more respect for all that Misha had done with his life over the years, while he sat at work, designing cell phones, and declining every chance he was offered to go abroad. He never felt the need to, not when his family and friends were right here.

Well, his family had been right here, Jensen corrected himself inwardly. Up until two years ago. And most of his so-called friends had vanished as soon as AJ happened. Jensen sighed quietly, but when Misha began another tale about the Buddhist monks he'd lived with, Jensen was quickly distracted from those thoughts.

They weren't home until three hours later, when AJ definitely needed a diaper change, and Jensen felt how his jaw and cheek muscles hurt from smiling.

***

Mackenzie called him at least once a week since he had AJ, but Jensen rarely had anything to say that didn't concern AJ or how he was doing. She sounded increasingly worried with each phone call these days, mostly because Jensen could never answer her question about himself with more than an "I'm getting by," or an "I'm okay, mostly. Just tired."

This week, though, Jensen could barely wait for her call.

"Hey, big bro. How's it going?" Mackenzie greeted him as soon as he picked up the phone.

"Better, squirt," he answered with a smile that apparently was too wide for her not to notice. "And hi."

"Oh," she said, obviously surprised at his tone. "You sound cheery. What happened? AJ doing better?"

Jensen hummed. "Yeah, the last two nights were a bit quieter."

"That can't be all, though, can it?"

"Um... I got a new neighbor," Jensen admitted, unable to keep the smile from his face as he wandered off to the kitchen, where he just set up the water to boil for AJ's formula.

"Go on."

Jensen shrugged, then remembered that she couldn't see it. "He's nice."

“He's _nice_ , u-huh. You're already crushing on him?” Mackenzie teased. "C'mon, I know that tone."

"Kinda. Sorta. He's hot," Jensen mumbled, feeling how a blush reddened his cheeks. "Has that whole tall, dark and handsome thing going for him. About my height. Blue eyes."

"So, totally your type," Mack summed it up.

"Yup," Jensen confirmed as he filled the clean bottle with formula, then the warm water.

"You know, sometimes I'm really glad that I've got a gay brother, just to talk boys with him," she laughed.

After twisting the cap on the bottle, Jensen started to shake it. "Shut up, shortstack."

“No, really. So, new neighbor have a name?”

“Misha.”

“And you're sure he's a guy?”

Jensen rolled his eyes. “Yes.”

“You seen his--”

“No, Mack,” Jensen interrupted her. “Jesus.”

“Time to find out, I'd say.”

“No,” Jensen interrupted her again. “Really. I mean, not that I wouldn't want to, but I've got bigger things to care about, like, you know, a baby of two months. Also, why would he even be interested in a single dad? Who even takes a guy with a child? I mean, that's trouble guaranteed. So, no. I won't. For his and my own sake.”

“The lady doth protest too much, methinks.”

“Shut your mouth,” Jensen groaned, without venom.

For a moment, Mackenzie was quiet. “Or maybe you're missing out. Yeah well, I can't make you ask him out. So anyway-”

This time, it wasn't Jensen who broke her flow of words. It was the doorbell. Jensen lifted his wrist in surprise and noted that it was half past 6 p.m. and he didn't expect anyone.

"Hold on, there's someone at the door," Jensen said into the speaker before holding the cordless phone against his chest.

The door viewer revealed none other than-

"Misha," Jensen greeted him delighted. They hadn't seen each other since the walk in the park two days before, and honestly, Jensen would have to lie to say he hadn't hoped for something to happen. Like, Misha standing at his door with a hopeful smile.

"Hey, um, sorry to interrupt,” he said with a pointed look at the phone in Jensen's hand. “I could come back later, if you want.”

Jensen waved him off with a smile. “Never mind. What is it?”

“So, I made veggie lasagna for dinner, and it turned out a bit much. Have you eaten yet?" Misha asked quickly with a twinkle in his eye that made Jensen admittedly a bit mushy inside. In no way would he be able to decline that offer.

"No, I was just preparing a bottle for AJ. Haven't had dinner myself already.”

"You wanna come over afterwards?" Misha scratched the back of his neck.

Jensen nodded his head Yes before he could even second-guess it. "Sure. If he sleeps, I'll be over in twenty minutes."

"If he doesn't, just take him with you," Misha winked, and then he turned his back on Jensen to return to his own apartment, giving Jensen an eyeful of lean, but obviously muscular shoulders, a broad back and an ass so delicious Jensen had the sudden urge to sink his teeth into it. Arousal welled up in him, although misplaced as it was in that moment. But, Jesus, that guy.

Only a cackle from the phone reminded him that Mack was still there. She laughed, bright and amused, when he lifted it to his ear again. "What are you laughing about?" Jensen grumbled, closing the door.

"Oh, nothing. Just... 'turned out a bit much', how is that not the lamest excuse in the history of ever for a dinner date."

"It's not a date."

"You tell yourself that, Jay. He's got a nice voice, by the way," Mackenzie added.

Jensen huffed. "Yeah, I noticed."

"Have fun," she said fondly.

"Thanks."

"Stay safe. Use a condom."

" _Mack_ ," Jensen groaned. "It's not like that."

"Because?"

"Because I'm his neighbor who he met only two weeks ago, I have a little kid who is top priority at the moment, and he doesn't even know I'm gay. Hell, I don't know if he is straight. Sure looks like he is," Jensen stated, unable to keep the edge of desperation out of his voice.

"Well, then find out, why don't you?" she urged him on. "Since when are you so shy about this?"

Jensen sighed. "Since I've got a baby to care about, which means that I can't just think of myself anymore?”

“You're still a person, too. You still have a life.”

“Yeah, well,” Jensen snorted, and left it at that, the implication clear.

The other end of the line was quiet for a few heavy moments where they both drifted off absentmindedly. But there wasn't really much more to say.

“Speaking of AJ, I need to give him his bottle,” Jensen broke the silence, his voice soft, “so, you know. Thanks for calling.”

“Sure thing, Jay. And I meant it – have fun.”

“I will. Bye.”

***

Twenty minutes later, Jensen stood at Misha's door with AJ in his carrier in one hand and a few supplies in the other. “He wouldn't sleep, so I just brought him along,” Jensen explained with an apologetic smile.

AJ looked up at him, baby blue eyes wide and alert and very, very awake.

Misha just grinned and waved him in, gave him a few minutes to settle with AJ before he dished up the lasagna. The casserole dish was huge, but Misha shrugged. “I only have the one.”

“Thanks for inviting me,” Jensen said after the first bite, “It's really good. So I sure as hell won't complain about your too-big casserole.”

Misha chuckled softly. “I still have to work on my kitchen equipment. I've been abroad for a while, and then... let's just say I needed to get most of this-” he gestured around the apartment with the hand holding the knife, “- new when I moved in.”

Jensen looked around, then, to notice that a few things were indeed obviously new, while others were blatantly serving a purpose they weren't meant to. Like an old school locker standing to the side of the kitchen, one door propped open and showing that Misha used it to stack food supplies in it. The creativity was fairly astounding, and Jensen approved of it. 

“I like it,” he said simply, because he might be gay, but he wouldn't get out the furniture catalogue and tell Misha how mismatched his interior was. It was rather charming, and it fit Misha's personality – well, as much as Jensen had got to know of it, so far.

They finished up the meal with alternately talking about what they had been up to for the last two days. Which, in Jensen's case, wasn't much except changing diapers and feeding AJ.

Just a few months back, he had never understood how new parents would always talk about their baby, and their baby only, as if there wasn't anything else to talk about. Now, he kind of understood – you took a step back, giving way to more important matters at hand, even though it meant giving up a part of yourself for a while.

Misha explained what he still wanted to do in the apartment, like build a few more chairs for the balcony and a cabinet to visually separate the working area from the rest of the living room.

“So, you're not only a part-time journalist, voice actor and translator, but also a carpenter?” Jensen asked amused when they were halfway through the meal.

“I know my way around, yes,” Misha answered with a smirk. “So if you need some work done, feel free to come over.”

“Thanks, I'll remember that.”

It was light and easy and safe conversation, and Jensen thought it was peaceful, calming. AJ made a few excited yelps from the sideline, turning his mushroom around in his hands, but eventually fell asleep.

“I guess that's my cue,” Jensen mused with a smile, then got to his feet to put his plate in the sink. “You need some help with the dishes?”

“Nah, that's what the dishwasher is for,” Misha said. “But thanks.”

He even walked Jensen to the door and said good night to the sleeping AJ with a soft stroke over his cheek. “Aren't you a little angel, huh?”

“Give him two hours, three tops,” Jensen laughed quietly.

When their eyes met over the baby's head, Jensen could have sworn that there was something other than just fond amusement shining in Misha's eyes, but he wasn't sure. So he quickly shook it off.

“Thanks again for the lasagna. Didn't know something without meat could be that delicious.”

Misha tsked with a shake of his head. “Anytime I can teach a Texan a culinary lesson.”

Jensen smiled. “Well, I had a good time. Good night, Misha.”

“Good night, Jensen.”

As Jensen walked across the hall to his own apartment door, an idea was forming in his head. So, on a complete whim, he turned back around and asked, “You do eat meat though, right? You're not a vegan or something?”

Misha stood in the doorway to his flat, obviously caught looking after Jensen. However, that was not Jensen's main focus right now, so he chose not to dwell on it. “Yes, but I eat only meat from organically fed animals. And as seldom as possible.”

Jensen tilted his head, raising one eyebrow questioningly. “How about a good Texan steak, fresh from the grill, tomorrow night? Organic, of course. If you, you know... I mean I know it's a Friday, so if you've got other stuff to do I'd totally understand.”

“No, I'd love to,” Misha's smile widened at the invitation. “See you tomorrow, then.”

And with that, he closed the door on Jensen, who stood baffled by his own door, toying with the keys in his hand.

Looks like he got a chance to pull out his new mini-grill for the balcony that he had bought for house parties not too long ago.

***

AJ woke him up not three hours later, when Jensen was still lounging on the couch and watching TV. Needless to say that his thoughts were somewhere else, but then the baby monitor flared up.

Jensen spent the next two hours – after a diaper change and the attempt at giving AJ another bottle - walking up and down his hallway, from his bedroom to the nursery and back, but AJ wouldn't calm down.

So it was one of those nights.

Jensen sighed and rubbed his eyes with the hand that wasn't holding AJ. The clock on his DVR said 1:55 a.m. when he eventually returned to the living room to flop down onto the couch exhaustedly. Jensen set the TV to mute, watching the news flickering over the screen as AJ cried so loud that his ears would ring later.

“Misha's gonna hate me, you know,” Jensen mumbled eventually. His words were drowned out by AJ's distressed screams, but it felt good to talk. It kept him grounded, kept his thoughts from drifting off to happier days. So he continued. “He's gonna hate me and move out and I'll never see him again, and that would be a pity. And you know what? I don't even blame you, AJ. You're a baby, and you just do what babies do. At least I try to see it that way, but I know you need your mom, and I'm not your mom. But I'm trying, you know. I'm trying to give you everything you need. I want to see you grow up happy and loved and I'll be there for you no matter what, no matter when. I promise. But I know I'll never be enough to replace your mom.”

He was too tired to raise his voice, so the whole confession came out in a monotone, soft rumble that apparently managed to get through to the baby somehow.

AJ had resolved into quiet sobs against Jensen's chest, his little fists clenching and unclenching repeatedly into Jensen's shirt, his face still beet red from the exhaustion of crying. Jensen raised a soft cloth with his spare hand to wipe away the tears and snot from AJ's face.

“I'm sorry I'm not your mom, AJ. I wish she was here. She'd sing you a lullaby and you'd probably be out like a light. I'm sorry you won't ever get to know her.”

A soft knock at the door startled Jensen.

Trying not to disturb AJ too much, he got up and headed for the door, only to find a sleepy Misha, dressed in pajamas, in front of it. He carried two mugs with a steaming drink in it, which smelled like tea.

Jensen smiled exhaustedly and let him in.

Misha made his way to the living room and put down the cups on the coffee table.

“Tea?” Jensen raised an eyebrow.

“Tea,” Misha nodded. “How's he doing?”

Jensen sighed. “We're having a fussy night.”

A smile slowly spread on Misha's lips. “I heard.”

“I'm sorry.”

“Nothing to be sorry about. Babies just are like that. For the first year, the only things they do is poop and scream.”

That got a huff out of Jensen.

“You think he's going to sleep now?” Misha asked with a nod at AJ, who had been quiet since Misha had shown up.

Big, innocent and still teary bright blue eyes looked up at Jensen, who sighed again. “Nah.”

With a pat, Misha invited him to sit down on the couch beside him. As soon as he sat, Jensen had the mug of tea offered to him. “Seriously, tea?”

“It's calming, and I thought you could use it,” Misha shrugged.

As if on cue, AJ started another wailing fit, and Jensen let his head drop back against the backrest of the sofa. “That I do.”

“It's green tea. By the amount of coffee I've seen you drink, the thein shouldn't be a problem for you.”

“I'll fall asleep on this spot as soon as AJ is out, no matter the coffee or tea,” Jensen chuckled over the sound of the crying baby in his arms. He stroked AJ's back gently before taking a sip from the mug. The green tea was flavored with lemon juice, and Jensen moaned when the hot, refreshing liquid warmed his throat and belly.

Misha watched him over the rim of his own cup. “Good?”

“Yeah, I... I've never been much of a tea drinker, you know. My mom used to make me peppermint tea when I was sick as a kid, and some other disgusting stuff when I had a stomach bug as a teenager-”

Misha's lips twitched as if he tried to hide a smile. “Fennel-anise-caraway tea?”

Jensen shrugged. “Probably. Is it disgusting?”

“I guess. Never liked it either.”

Jensen smiled as he drank from his mug. Only then did he notice that they were sitting so close together that his elbow touched Misha's when sitting, and said spot started tingling. To avoid awkwardness, Jensen quickly shifted in his seat to get at least an inch between them. He said he wouldn't risk this.

_This_ , as in, Misha looking out for him, bringing him tea and offering moral support during a night like this.

“I didn't even say thank you, did I?” Jensen mumbled during a short break in AJ's whining. “I'm sorry. I mean. Thank you, for everything, and sorry for-”

“Again, there's nothing you have to apologize for,” Misha stated solemnly.

“Really? Because I know that was rude of me, and not even the situation as it is is an excuse for that. I mean, you're up all night because I can't take care of a baby properly.”

For a moment, Misha gaped at him, obviously searching for words. “What? Do you seriously think he's crying because you're not-”

Jensen shrugged and let his head drop onto his chest, placing a quick kiss on AJ's head. “Kinda,” he said into the soft fluff of blond baby hair.

“Jensen,” Misha said sternly, and Jensen heard the clank of a mug being placed on the table before Misha's hand landed on his shoulder, demanding with a quick shake that Jensen looked over.

Big, bright blue eyes were shining at him in the eerily flickering light of the TV that was long forgotten, and they were so sad that Jensen felt his heart ache.

The things he'd like to do, really. Things like hug Misha, pull him close, kiss him until he's breathless and the damn sadness in his eyes is replaced with the amused twinkle that he’d gotten used to over the past few days as they got to know each other. Kiss him until he's melting into Jensen's arms, fitting perfectly into the crook of his neck, and Jensen could bury his nose in that wild mop of brown hair.

But, yeah, not gonna happen.

“Jensen, listen to me,” Misha insisted, breaking the spell that had somehow fallen over them. “I know you're doing your best. I see you're doing your best. And from what I see, you're also doing pretty damn well. So don't blame yourself for his crying. Like I said, babies are like that, and they don't mean to tell you that you're a horrible parent. It's just the only way they can communicate, for now. Food? Cry. Diaper full? Cry. Daddy's not here? Cry.”

Jensen smiled, felt how his eyes got increasingly heavy with fatigue, but also a warm fondness curling in his stomach. Which might or might not be connected to the weary smile on Misha's face.

“You might not see it that way now, but you're a pretty amazing father, especially for someone who wasn't prepared for that role. Trust me, I know.”

Jensen's stupid heart skipped a beat at that, and he felt a hot blush rising on his cheeks. To cover it, he emptied his mug of tea and rocked AJ a bit back and forth.

“Look, he's fallen asleep,” Misha's smile widened as he looked at the slumbering baby on Jensen's chest.

“Huh,” Jensen commented surprised. “Well, I'll try to put him into his crib, then.”

Wordlessly, Misha took the cup from his outstretched hand.

By the time AJ was bundled up in his blanket and huffing out soft little snorts in his sleep, Misha was already standing at the door, waiting for Jensen.

That damn smile was still on his lips.

Jensen took a deep breath as he closed the door to the nursery behind him, then stepped up to Misha. “Again, thank you. For the tea and... and what you said. It's good to hear.”

“My pleasure, and that was simply the truth. Sleep well, Jensen,” he replied fondly.

“You, too. I'll see you tonight,” Jensen returned the smile, didn't want to think about how much of a date it was or wasn't that he would be cooking for Misha.

“Yeah. See you.”

Misha waved once before leaving, and only when he had shut the entrance door and leaned with his forehead against the wood, Jensen realized that he had completely overheard a very important detail that Misha had dropped earlier.

'Trust me, I know.'

Jensen hadn't bothered to ask him how he knew.


	3. Chapter 3

“I have no idea why, but he's crying like, every hour or so now, but he always finishes his bottle,” Jensen sighed. “Am I doing something wrong?”

AJ happily kicked his feet into the air as Dr. Padalecki – Jensen still had to get used to calling him Jared – examined him. “Well, he's a growing boy, so he needs his nutrition,” he chuckled, shooting Jensen a soft smile. “He’s big for his age and there’s the fact that he’s a premie. He’s still getting the premie formula?”

Jensen nodded as a yawn forced him to turn away and hide it from the pediatrician.

“No constipation lately?”

Jensen huffed. “Try the opposite.”

“You can try feeding him with the next available follow-up milk. Keep an eye out how he tolerates it. If it leads to constipation, you may need to switch back to the premie formula, at least for a few meals.”

“Alright.”

Jared shot him another concerned look as he heaved AJ onto the scale. “You don't look too good, Jensen. You should take better care of yourself.”

Yeah, right, Jensen thought and huffed again. Like he had time for that.

“I'm serious. The little man here is very healthy, so you can spend a little more time worrying about yourself,” Jared added with a frown.

“I'm trying, okay?” Jensen offered, slumping against the table beside Jared.

Jared watched him skeptically as he kept AJ entertained, tickling him until the baby was squealing and grabbing for Jared's hands. Really big, strong, and yet dexterous fingers that would've sent Jensen's imagination into overdrive if it were any other situation than the current one.

“You know,” Jared started into an explanation, “some women experience a kind of depression that is triggered by childbirth, which is called postpartum depression. Believe it or not, but men can experience it, too, especially when they had to live through a traumatic situation or have very little support from their environment. Sound familiar?”

Jensen gave a noncommittal grunt. “So what, I gotta see a shrink now?”

“Depends,” Jared said, picking AJ up and cradling him in his arms. “Let me ask you a few things first. Do you feel melancholic these days, not because of your brother necessarily, but because of the situation as a whole? It's hard to get up and go grocery shopping, take care of your apartment, or go for a walk with AJ – let's say, a general lack in motivation?”

“Yeah,” Jensen confirmed.

“Your libido?”

Jensen scoffed. “Non-existent.”

“You feel like you're alone in the world and no one's helping you?”

“Kinda. I mean, my sister lives too far away, but she calls every other day. I know she can't do much more.”

Jared nodded. “Be honest with me here, under doctor-patient confidentiality... Do you have suicidal thoughts, or thoughts of killing AJ?”

At that, Jensen was taken aback. “What? No!”

Jared just watched him attentively, but eventually raised one hand defensively. “Just needed to know. It's sometimes part of the clinical picture, I didn't want to imply that you would.”

“No, no. Seriously. I would _never_ ,” Jensen reassured, then noticed that AJ was holding out his hand towards him. “Hey, AJ,” he said softly, then, “you wanna come over?”

With a smile, Jared transferred the baby to Jensen's arms. “That's another thing I noticed, by the way. You don't baby talk with him at all. I don't think I've ever heard a 'Where's your daddy?' from you.”

Jensen had his eyes on AJ, who snuggled immediately into his chest, when he answered. “I hate it when people do that.” _And I'm not his daddy,_ Jensen thought.

When he looked up, Jared once again threw a skeptical, but slightly amused glance at him. “Do you feel depressed?” he asked out of the blue.

“Yeah, I do,” Jensen admitted with a shrug. “But it's not like... not like I'm gonna kill myself or anything. I mean, it's gonna get better someday, right? I'm just more emotional than I was before AJ happened.”

“How do you feel towards AJ?”

“What do you mean? He's a sweet kid, if he's not crying and keeping me up all night.”

“Do you feel attached to him?” Jared clarified.

“Well, yeah. He's my nephew, and I wanna take care of him. Wanna see him grow up and all that. His dad would've wanted that.”

Jared pushed himself to his full height to come to a stand in front of Jensen. “Okay, so here's what I'm thinking – you two need to bond. For the birth mother, it's usually that after giving birth, she gets the baby placed onto her chest so they can get to know each other. The hormones do the rest, you might say. It's already harder for mothers who give birth via C-section, because they haven't had the bonding experience of the birth process. I think it's safe to say that it's even harder for you, since you were thrown into the father's role from one day to the next without a warning or even a nine month time period to get used to the idea of being a father.”

Jensen stayed silent and gently stroked over AJ's head, lost in thought. He couldn't deny that Jared had a point, though.

“So it might help to play and talk some more with him, whether you talk normally with him or not. A baby hears the voice of its mother throughout the pregnancy, but AJ has to get used to your voice. So talk with him. Sing to him at night. Anything. Let him sleep on your chest or in his baby sling.”

“Okay,” Jensen nodded, then looked down at AJ, whose eyes were fixed on him as he blew spit bubbles into the air. “Looks like you've gotta get more used to me, little one.”

AJ let out an amused little giggle and nudged his head into Jensen's chest. Jensen smiled.

When he looked back up at Jared, the doctor smiled, too. “You'll see, it's gonna be fine. If you feel like the depression or anything doesn't get better, you definitely tell me. Are we clear?”

“Yes, doc,” Jensen said with a small smirk.

“And try to think of yourself a bit. Maybe get a babysitter that can take care of him at least once a week so you can, I don't know, go out on a date or anything. Meet people. That should help, too,” Jared advised.

Misha came to mind at that, but Jensen was still sure that he wouldn't chase after him. He had enough on his plate lately, anyway.

“It's not that easy, you know,” Jensen sighed. “I don't know how much I can trust other people with him, and I know it has to do with me being a perfectionist and always wanting to be in control. I feel like everything is enough _out_ of my control at the moment, so I can't risk that, too.”

“You gotta let people into your life again, Jensen, or else you're gonna lose your mind one of these days. You're giving up a bit of control, sure, but imagine what you're gonna get in return for that.”

“Hm,” Jensen mumbled, mulling it over.

“Trust me, it'll be worth it.”

AJ fell asleep somewhere during their conversation.

***

“Happy belated birthday!”

Jensen blinked the sleepiness out of his eyes. Sure, it was almost lunchtime, but AJ had been fast asleep and Jensen would've been stupid not to use the time for a nap. When he eventually managed to get the fog out of his brain, the realization of who stood in front of him made him grin widely.

“Hey, Mack!” Jensen swooped her up in his arms and even lifted her up from the floor. “Jeez, it's like I never see you anymore.”

“I know, I know. But that's why I'm here now,” she winked, then pulled the strap of her duffel bag higher onto her shoulder.

“Here, let me take this,” Jensen quickly said, untangling the handle from her arm. “Why don't you come in-”

“Did I miss your birthday?” an amused voice commented from the stairs and effectively interrupted him.

“Misha,” Jensen smiled, admittedly caught in the headlights.

_Oh, just peachy,_ he thought when he noticed his little sister's eyes going big and round as they took in Misha in all his sweaty and just-back-from-a-run state. Jensen swallowed heavily, both from the picture his neighbor presented himself with, and from the impending awkwardness Mackenzie would put him in, whether he liked it or not. Because that was what little sisters did.

“So you're Jensen's neighbor,” she smiled. “I'm Mackenzie.”

“Jensen's sister,” Misha concluded and took her offered hand to shake it. “I heard a lot about you.”

“And I of you,” she grinned wickedly and Jensen had the sudden urge to slap her upside the head.

He rolled his eyes instead.

“So, let me repeat: Did I miss your birthday? Because I heard that down to the first floor,” Misha asked curiously, focusing back on Jensen.

“March 1st,” Mack supplied with an accusing glance at Jensen, who shrugged.

Misha raised his eyebrows. “That was three weeks ago!”

“Yeah, and it was no big deal,” Jensen interposed.

“No big deal,” Misha huffed, then reached his arms out towards Jensen, only to shake his head and let them drop down to his sides again. “Wait a minute, I'm disgusting.”

“You should probably shower, yeah,” Jensen grinned at him. “Save the hug for later.”

Misha headed off towards his apartment as he hollered in badly imitated Austrian, “I will be back!”

Jensen laughed after him, genuinely amused and also looking forward to whatever Misha planned for later. Having known Misha for over a month, Jensen had gotten a lot more comfortable with him. He also knew that Misha would not just come over to give him a belated happy birthday hug, and the thought made him admittedly a lot giggly.

There had been a couple nights with green tea and lemon, and there had been a couple walks in the park with coffee in the past three weeks. It wasn't like those were dates at all, but Misha worked at the weirdest day- and nighttimes anyway and didn't have any friends around Dallas, either. 

Jensen was just thankful for the company. So they hung out quite a lot.

“You didn't celebrate at all, did you?” Mackenzie chased when they entered his apartment and she took off her coat.

Jensen shrugged again. “So? Or wait, let me return that question: what is a college girl doing here instead of celebrating spring break on South Padre Island?”

“Your birthday was three weeks ago, and I couldn't come here because of mid-terms. Also, I kind of missed you, jerkface,” she said without venom.

Jensen smiled fondly, then hugged her again, on a whim. “Don't get me wrong, squirt. I'm glad you're here.”

“I'm glad I'm here, too. Although-” Mackenzie tilted her head as she shoved him away to scold at him from arm's length, “- you could've warned me about Mr. Rogers over there.”

“I told you about him,” Jensen defended himself with a frown.

“Yeah, but you didn't tell me just _how_ hot he was.”

“If I recall correctly, I told you about him being funny and snarky and incredibly smart on top of being pretty hot. Plus, you saw him in his running gear, and that's totally one-upping the situation.”

At that, Mackenzie turned towards him and squinted.

“What,” Jensen asked flatly.

“Just... how gone are you on him and to which percentage are you sure he's even a little into guys?” she asked concerned.

Jensen sighed heavily. “One: too much, and two: I have absolutely no idea.”

“Okay,” Mackenzie nodded, acknowledging the answer but obviously not approving in the least, “So I've brought you a gift,” she added while rummaging through her purse.

“Mack, you shouldn't have-”

“Shut up, I wanted to. Just take it,” she interrupted him and held a simple, white envelope towards him.

After a last, skeptical look at her, Jensen took it. At opening it, two tickets for the cinema complex two blocks away fell out. Jensen sighed again. It wasn't like they had financial problems; Jensen was still on paid paternity leave, and they had inherited enough from their parents and Josh to pay for Mackenzie's college and tutoring. But Jensen knew that she had paid these tickets from what little she earned at the coffee shop, where she worked on the weekends, or had taken some money out of the monthly payment he made to her account for food and other living expenses.

“Thank you, Mack,” Jensen coughed, suddenly feeling emotional over the seemingly small gesture.

“Don't thank me before you've seen all there is,” she grinned.

“There's more?” Jensen asked surprised as he took another look into the envelope.

And indeed, snug against the backside of the paper was a card for the steakhouse opposite of said cinema complex building, and a handwritten note. 

_Birthday voucher_ , it read on the outside in capital letters written in sharpie, every letter in a different color.

Jensen unfolded it with a quick glance at Mackenzie, who looked a bit nervous and smiled shakily.

_Voucher for babysitting AJ for one night. Have fun for once!_

Jensen smiled as his eyes betrayed him by watering up. “Thanks,” he rasped out again before wrapping Mackenzie up in the third hug of that day.

“You're welcome,” she replied with emphasis.

That was when Jensen realized a tiny detail. “But who's the second ticket for if you're babysitting AJ?”

She only raised an eyebrow and smirked. “Whomever you'd like to go to dinner and a movie with.”

“Okay, I'm not sure if I should still be thankful or angry at you for meddling with my non-existent love life,” Jensen grumbled.

“How about you decide that while I go say hello to AJ, alright?” she smiled overly sweet as she headed off to the living room, where AJ was laying on a fluffy blanket on the couch, playing with his mushroom.

Jensen looked after her, lost in thought.

***

Later, when the doorbell rang, Jensen couldn't answer the door quick enough.

At least not quick enough for Mackenzie to not follow him and see everything, from Misha's sweet smile to the tight hug he pulled Jensen into after handing him a single muffin with barely dried frosting and a candle on it. Jensen held on to Misha for what it was worth while holding the muffin with his other hand, trying not to set anything on fire with the candle or have it squashed between them. And everything was just so unfair, because Misha smelled amazing, freshly showered as he was, and Jensen didn't want the hug to end, no matter how awkward it was with the muffin involved.

“Thank you,” he mumbled before pulling away, relishing in the feeling of Misha's had running down his back. “Also - you made me a muffin?”

“Muffins,” Misha corrected while pointing towards his apartment. “The others are still in my kitchen. In my defense, it was a mix.”

_Ask him out,_ Mackenzie mouthed towards Jensen, behind Misha's back.

He only rolled his eyes. Not a good time.

Misha only stayed for a few minutes before he had to return to his place for a report he had to write for the Morning News.

“Why didn't you ask him for dinner?” Mackenzie asked practically as soon as the door was shut.

“It's not like--” Jensen started, then grumbled, “We have dinner all the time. It's nothing special.”

Mackenzie flopped down on the sofa beside AJ, obviously dumbfounded. “First off, _hell yes_ going out to dinner is special, and second, you _what_?”

Jensen took a seat on AJ's other side before answering meekly, “Yeah, you know, after that first time with the veggie lasagna, I invited him for steak the day after, and since then... we took turns, you know. It's easier to cook for two than for one anyway, and it saves one of us the trouble. He's a great cook, by the way. Very creative.”

For a moment, the frown remained on her face, but it softened quickly. “You didn't tell me that.”

“Of course not, you just would've made fun of me or cooed over us, when there's nothing there,” Jensen groused while tickling AJ and letting him play with his fingers.

Mackenzie watched him thoughtfully and nibbled on her bottom lip. “I'm sorry if you feel like I'm making fun of you, because I don't. Honestly, I don't. I just think it's sweet and I know I go overboard with the cooing and meddling... a bit, but after mom and dad and Josh, it's like... it's like he's the one good thing that happened to you, right?”

Her voice had become shakier with every word, eventually breaking mid-sentence. She sniffed and quickly wiped at her running nose with her sleeve, a habit Jensen never managed to break her free from.

“He is,” Jensen nodded instead of commenting on the silent tear that rolled down her cheek.

“So why won't you just take that chance?”

“Okay, I know for sure that I explained that to you.”

“You did, but after having seen you with him, I honestly don't get it. You obviously like him. He obviously likes you. You cook for each other every day, for crying out loud. He hugs you for your birthday like _that_ and you're telling me there's nothing there? Are you sure you just don't _want_ anything to be there?”

“Maybe I do,” Jensen admitted. “Because I can't deal with it right now.”

After a deep breath and a nod, Mackenzie shot him a sad glance. “I kind of get it, you know. But you should still have some fun tonight. It doesn't have to be a date. Dinner and a movie with a friend is great, too. Really anything to get you out of the house and away from AJ for a bit.”

“You're sure you can take care of him? He's crying a bit less these days, but he's still up every two to three hours,” Jensen warned.

Mackenzie just smiled softly. “I'm sure I can handle him. Isn't that right, AJ?” she looked down at the giggling baby, who currently chewed on his hand. “Huh, baby boy? Aunt Mack is gonna take good care of you while daddy's out, isn't she?”

At that, Jensen shook his head vigorously. “Mack, don't. I'm not his dad. Don't call me that.”

He swallowed heavily, unable to look into her eyes when she looked over. 

“Oh, um. Right. Sorry,” she answered, the moment suddenly loaded with sadness. “I didn't mean to-”

Jensen interrupted her before she could say any more. “I know you didn't. It's just... I can't be his dad.”

“Will you raise him like that? As his uncle? He's gonna ask questions sooner or later. Probably sooner if everyone at kindergarten or pre-school has a dad, and he has an uncle,” Mackenzie pointed out.

“I... honestly, I haven't thought of it that much. But right now, I can't see myself as his dad. Josh is still his dad.”

“Josh will always be his father. Biologically. But if you raise him, take care of him, change his diapers and pay for his food and education, you're as much his dad as Josh is.”

Jensen felt tears prickling in the corners of his eyes yet again. “Damnit,” he mumbled.

“It's not like you need to decide that now,” Mackenzie added for consideration. “I'm just saying.”

They fell silent for a short minute before Jensen said, “Alright, I'll ask him out.”

Mackenzie perked up, surprised by the change of subject, but then she smiled fondly. “Great. I have the distinct feeling that you won't regret it.”

***

“Hey, uh. Have you finished that report of yours?” Jensen asked and couldn't help but feel a bit shy, standing in front of Misha's apartment door.

“Yeah, half an hour ago,” Misha raised an eyebrow, probably expecting that he was let down for dinner tonight, seeing as Mackenzie was in town.

“Alright,” Jensen nodded, before rambling on, “so it's my turn to cook tonight, and Mackenzie gave me a voucher for the steakhouse, you know, the one near the cinema complex? And I wanted to ask you if we should just eat out tonight. She offered to babysit AJ.”

“Sure,” Misha smiled. “When did you want to go?”

“Uhm, since I've got two tickets for a movie, too, I'd say around seven?”

For a moment, Misha just stared and blinked at him, processing that piece of information. Then his lips slowly split into a knowing grin.

Jensen pretended not to notice, pretended that this wasn't a dinner and a movie date, pretended that this was all just because his little sister gave him a present and he had no one else to use it with. So he returned the grin with an innocent smile. He didn't want to give Misha the wrong – which was in fact the completely right – idea about what this was.

Plus, Jensen didn't want to give away how nervous he truly felt.

“I'll pick you up,” Misha winked eventually.

“Great! See you later,” Jensen took a deep breath and grinned, then waved a bit awkwardly before returning to his own apartment.

“That was the lamest version of asking someone out that I've ever heard in my life,” Mackenzie scolded him, waiting behind the door.

“Were you eavesdropping?”

“Maybe?”

Jensen groaned and rolled his eyes. “I can't believe you. Now c'mon, help me pick out something to wear.”

***

An hour and an almost-argument later, Jensen was dressed in his favorite pair of dark jeans and a denim button-down that Mackenzie insisted Misha would 'want to rip off of you immediately.'

Misha had shown up not five minutes later in a black button-down that had made Jensen seriously rethink his intentions towards the man. He had had the overwhelming need to lean down and kiss Misha stupid, which had alternated with the idea to just pull Misha into his bedroom right away and not come out of it again until the morning.

Of course, he hadn't done either. He had just put on his poker face and had smiled surprised.

“You've got all the numbers ready?” Jensen had asked before closing the door behind himself.

“Yes,” Mackenzie had sighed and held up the piece of paper Jensen had written for her earlier. “Your cell, Misha's, and for emergencies Dr. Padalecki's. I know how to call 911, too, believe it or not.”

“Mack, you know what I mean.”

“I know,” she had answered softly, then stepped forward and hugged him quickly. “We're gonna be fine, don't worry.”

Jensen had only been able to give her a quick smile.

And yes, maybe he checked his cell a bit too often before their meals arrived, but he couldn't help it. Also, this was totally not a date, so-

“You're gonna hear it, you know,” Misha interrupted his train of thought, without any anger in his voice. Quite the opposite, in fact, a small smirk curled the edge of his lips. “Just set it to vibration.”

“I'm sorry, I'm just...” Jensen shrugged and put his phone down on the table, tracing the keypad to keep his fingers busy.

“-worried, I know. And I'm sure Mackenzie will call if something happens. I'm also sure she's perfectly able to handle AJ,” Misha placated him, then took a sip of his beer.

“It's weird, you know. I mean, I've been around him 24/7 during the past three months, and I kind of miss him,” Jensen admitted meekly.

Misha sighed and smiled softly. “I know. But I think Mackenzie chose this gift so you could get your mind off worrying about him for once, so try to enjoy it, alright?” And with that, he reached over the table and for a short, heart-stopping moment, covered Jensen's hand with his own.

Jensen had a hard time not flinching or showing the hitch in his breath. Misha's hand was warm and calloused and Jensen wanted nothing more than to turn his own palm and hold onto it. Instead, Misha's fingers quickly worked the phone out from under Jensen's hand.

When Jensen looked up, he noticed that Misha had been watching him the whole time; not his hand, his face. Clearing his throat, Jensen tried not to seem like a flustered teenager and put himself back together.

In the meantime, Misha unlocked Jensen's phone and hesitated for a few seconds before finding what he apparently searched for.

“There,” he said when he held it towards Jensen, “on vibration. You'll notice when it goes off in your pocket.”

“Yeah, um, sorry,” Jensen muttered, and, “Thanks,” before he put it away. He didn't mean to be rude, but Misha was also right. He sighed.

The night only improved after that. It took Jensen a while to get used to the idea of not having to check his messages every minute, but as soon as their dishes were served and they dug in, he gradually let loose. Misha made it easy for him, made him laugh and shot him all kinds of looks that Jensen didn't want to interpret the wrong way. If Jensen was honest with himself, he almost had to admit that Misha was maybe flirting with him. Like, a little. But maybe that was just him, so Jensen purposely shoved the thought back into the depths of his brain.

By the time they sat in the cinema and watched a British action comedy – because apparently, Mack had thought it would be a good choice – he didn't even think so much about Mack and AJ anymore.

Jensen's thoughts were utterly consumed by the man beside him, by his beautiful laughter and dirty chuckles, by the way he wouldn't flinch away from grabbing into the bag of popcorn even when Jensen's hand was already in it, and by the way their elbows touched on the armrest. The truth was that Jensen hadn't been that relaxed in months, not since Josh's accident. He hadn't had that much fun and laughed so much for at least as long.

Misha did him good, there was no denying it.

Jensen stole short glances in-between scenes and in the darkness of the movie theater, he didn't even need to be subtle about it. It seemed like Misha was focused on the movie only, and Jensen just loved when a scene made him frown or laugh or really, anything that made his eyes crinkle and his lips curl.

Then Jensen remembered that he was staring and he tried to watch the movie again.

Because this was not a date.

Because he didn't even know if Misha was interested.

And because he had a baby of three months at home and there was no way he would drag anyone into this.

But that didn't mean he wouldn't enjoy this.

***

They were home by half past eleven, where Jensen found himself in the awkward situation of standing in front of his own apartment door, fumbling around with his keys, unwilling to just bid Misha good night. Misha had one hand in his jeans pocket, where his own keys clinked.

Neither one of them wanted to just part like this, apparently, but Jensen didn't know what to say. 'I had fun tonight,' seemed like the obvious choice, but also like a too casual and really bad line to end a date. Which it hadn't been in the first place, anyway.

“I had fun tonight,” Misha said eventually, “and as cheesy and lame as that sounds, we should do this more often.”

Jensen chuckled and raised his eyebrows, “Yeah, if Mack would be in town to babysit more often.”

Their eyes locked, and Jensen recognized both some sort of daring look as well as an endearing fondness in Misha's. With a frown, he sighed deeply.

“For the record, I had fun tonight, too,” Jensen admitted, then added quickly, “even though that sounds like we've been on a date.”

“Which we... haven't,” Misha faltered before the dismissal, which made Jensen's stupid heart flutter.

“No, of course not,” Jensen clarified before he cleared his throat.

Misha nodded, and for a second he almost looked sad. Again, maybe it was just Jensen hoping and imagining, so he quickly looked down to the floor. He couldn't quite stand to see Misha right now, not when he had just lied to his face about the situation they were in.

“Good night, Jensen,” Misha said softly, and Jensen heard the smile in his voice before he saw it.

Misha stood too close to him; so close, in fact, that Jensen could smell his aftershave with the undertone of something that was inherently _Misha,_ and he liked that combination a lot. He had smelled it for the whole evening, but it hadn't been as prominent as it was now. The fragrance was intoxicating, intriguing, and it even made Jensen's struggling libido flare up for a moment.

“Good night, Misha,” he rasped, and only had half a second's notice before Misha's arms wrapped around his neck.

Jesus, that wasn't fair. It really, really wasn't.

Jensen's heart was racing like it wanted to jump out of his chest, his brain was swimming in endorphins and he wanted to bury his face in Misha's neck and never let go. 

But that wasn't going to happen and Jensen knew it. He just had to remind himself that this was a platonic hug, that they hadn't been on a date.

No matter how it felt all evening, no matter how Jensen felt in that moment.

However, he pulled Misha closer with both arms around his waist, savored the moment of holding Misha flush against his body, before they both realized that they held on to each other a bit longer than necessary.

“Thank you,” Jensen muttered as his hands ran along the small of Misha's back, retreating until they fell back to his side. They itched, though, wanted to touch, wanted to feel the warmth of Misha's skin under his fingertips.

“You're welcome,” Misha smiled a bit bashfully. With that, he turned around and headed to his own apartment door, unlocking it and entering his home.

Jensen stood there, not ashamed to follow him with his eyes, even though Misha sent him one last smile before closing the door.

When Jensen had his own door locked behind himself, he leaned back against it and sighed. It had been a month, barely more than a month, for him to develop these kind of feelings for Misha, and it was scary. Jensen didn't want to get attached, didn't want AJ to get attached, and yet he found Misha increasingly invading his life and him loving every second of it. Jensen even craved for more, wanted Misha around, wanted to look at him and touch him and hear his laughter echoing through his apartment.

Jensen groaned.

He was so screwed.


	4. Chapter 4

Life, as it always did, went on.

Mack had stayed at Jensen's place for only a day longer, since she had to return to her job and college, so that first evening out with Misha had remained the only one so far. Thankfully, Jensen didn't have the feeling that anything awkward remained between them after the not-a-date and the hug. Misha came around at night more often than not, sometimes three times in a row, sometimes only two times a week.

The point was, they were comfortable with each other. However, Jensen hadn't dared to touch the matter of Misha's cryptic 'trust me, I know' with a ten foot pole. That they were comfortable with each other didn't mean Jensen had any right to ask Misha about it, and he didn't want to disturb their friendship.

By the end of April, AJ started to roll around on the floor, and Jensen had to keep a close eye on him. It got easier to play with him, because AJ reacted quicker to his environment, and Jensen burst into laughter the first time Misha made him roll back and forth by distracting him with a toy. AJ's confused face and his following laughter were heart-melting, although the man holding AJ's toy was also factoring into that.

Their nights got at least a little quieter and the periods of sleep a bit longer – anything more than two hours was an improvement in Jensen's book – and Misha came to the conclusion that AJ's baby colic was apparently over.

“Try to enjoy the time before he starts teething,” Misha had said with a grin. Then he had picked AJ up, who had squeaked in delight. “Isn't that right, AJ? You're not gonna be a good boy for your daddy once the teeth come, am I right?”

“Um, I...” Jensen had started, but couldn't quite get the words out. “I'm not sure about the daddy thing.”

“Well, how do you refer to yourself when you're talking with him?” Misha had asked, quite a bit confused.

“Dunno, mostly I just talk in first person,” Jensen had shrugged.

Misha had squinted, obviously mulled it over. “Now that I'm thinking about it, I haven't ever heard you talk to him like that, that's true. So you don't like being called daddy?”

“Not really, no,” Jensen had huffed, “although-”

“What about papa? I always thought it was way cuter.”

AJ had started to giggle and babble at that, and Misha had imitated him in a way that had made Jensen smile, too.

“AJ seems to like papa,” Misha had said with a pointed look at Jensen. “Do you like papa, AJ? Say papa? Pa-paa.”

The baby just went on to slap his little palm onto Misha's chest excitedly, followed by another series of happy babbling.

Jensen had shaken his head in amusement before he plucked AJ from Misha's arms. “Or maybe it's gonna be daddy one day, who knows?” it had come out sharper than he intended it to be.

Misha had just given him a funny look.

That night, they watched TV, just some football game that Jensen didn't even care about flickering over the screen, when Jensen decided to address what had been going through his head all day.

“Hey, um, I think I owe you an explanation,” Jensen started, then took a deep breath, “about the daddy versus papa thing. Mack asked me about this when she was here, too, and I haven't really come to a conclusion since then. Well, you know, I'm not his dad. So I don't know if I have any right raising him to believe that I am.”

Misha nodded and nibbled on his bottom lip for a moment before answering, “No matter what you do, he'll always have questions when he's older. Even if you tell him from the beginning that you're his uncle, one day he'll ask where his mom and dad are.”

“I'm not thinking about the easiest way to deal with this, I'm asking what the morally right thing to do is,” Jensen clarified.

“If you ask me, that's easy,” Misha deadpanned. “You are the one who raises him, and that makes you his dad.”

“What makes you so sure?”

Misha shrugged. “Have you looked at families these days? Let me give you this example - You can donate sperm and eggs. You can have a surrogate mother carry the child to term, and you can adopt that child once it's born. In that constellation, that child has three moms and two dads. So why would you be any less of a parent to AJ, only because you're not his biological father?”

With a frown, Jensen huffed. “I see your point. But I'm...” he broke off and left the sentence unfinished, admittedly too scared to finish it. Instead, he took a sip from the glass of wine they had poured themselves earlier.

Misha waited patiently, didn't push.

Eventually, Jensen blinked away the wetness in his eyes and stated quietly, “I'm afraid that I'll erase my brother's legacy or the role he has in AJ's life if I raise him to believe that I'm his dad.”

“Just because you let AJ call you daddy doesn't mean you'll never explain to him what happened. It doesn't change the past.”

“That his mom and dad died in a horrific car crash,” Jensen sighed and shook his head. The words came easier now, even though it still hurt to think of Josh and Mary-Ann. “And that the person he called dad all his life isn't his dad at all.”

“And you know what he's going to say?” Misha raised an eyebrow questioningly. “He'll say that he doesn't care, that you might not be his father but he loves you and you're still his daddy. Or, papa, you know. I'm still all for papa.”

Jensen smiled weakly.

“You'll see,” Misha pointed at him, then raised his own glass to drink. “And as long as you don't try to completely exchange your brother for yourself in AJ's life, then you're not taking away any of his legacy.”

“It's not like I could replace either one of his parents, even if I wanted to.”

“That you're considering this and thinking about it tells that more than enough. And as long as you don't forget that, you're fine. It doesn't mean that they would've been a better parent than you are or that you won't raise him to be a good man. That simply means that you're not the only parent in his life, even though he never got around to meeting Josh and Mary-Ann.”

“Thank you, Misha,” Jensen said sincerely, and felt like a huge load was taken off his mind. “That's really good to hear.”

Misha clapped his hand down on Jensen's shoulder in support.

Jensen noticed that they were sitting way too close yet again, that even their knees were touching, but he pushed the urge to kiss Misha quickly aside.

***

One all-together ordinary morning at the beginning of May, Jensen opened the door to a sweaty Misha in his running attire.

“Morning, Mish,” Jensen greeted him with a tired smile, a half-asleep AJ perched on his hip.

“Morning, my dear neighbor,” Misha answered with a grin and shoved a disposable paper cup from the coffee shop down the street into his hand. 

“Thank you!”

“I'll see you later!”

With that, Misha disappeared into his own apartment to take a shower, and Jensen nudged the door with his hip until it fell shut.

“I'm getting really used to this, you know, AJ?” Jensen smiled down at the baby. He took a sip from his coffee, then, and hummed contentedly. Sweet and strong, just the way he liked it. Misha had made it a habit during the past few weeks to bring Jensen a cup of coffee when he came back from his run, knowing how busy Jensen was in the morning. Jensen didn't really mind, because he was the one who made Misha breakfast in return.

AJ tried to slap the cup out of his hand with a delighted laugh as Jensen made his way to the kitchen.

“Na-uh, little man, forget it, that's daddy's,” Jensen said on purpose. He had to get used to the term after all, even though Misha still tried to convince him to use 'papa' instead.

Luckily, AJ lost his interest for the cup quickly, and instead started to work his little palms into Jensen's shirt like a cat.

Jensen had to shift his hold onto the boy. “You're tickling me, AJ,” he chuckled, then pressed a quick kiss to his forehead. 

While Jensen prepared his, Misha's and AJ's breakfast in the kitchen, AJ was seated at the kitchen table with a spoon to play with, and Jensen sipped from his cup between preparing pancake batter and heating up the water for AJ's bottle. The baby book Mack had gotten him a while back said that AJ would be ready for pulp soon, since he was almost five months old now.

Only one month to go before Jensen had to return to work.

The thought made his head ache, though, so he'd rather not think about it.

By the time the pancakes were done, Misha had shown up at his door again with his half-full cup of latte in his hands and his hair still partially wet. They had breakfast together, Jensen feeding AJ in-between bites of pancake and syrup, and talked about nothing in particular.

Jensen also didn't want to think too hard about this domestic situation they found themselves in lately, because he didn't want to jinx it.

It just worked, like that, effortlessly and comfortably, with Misha.

When they had filled up the dishwasher, Misha turned to him and said, “I'll have to check in with the Morning News today, which will probably take until lunchtime. I thought I'd pick up some groceries on the way home. Do you need anything, too?”

“Actually,” Jensen began, quickly checking his mental shopping list, “I think I'm good, I was out the day before yesterday... but there was something I forgot.”

Jensen turned to the fridge, and it took him exactly one look at the door to remember.

“The milk! Right. Could you please pick up two cartons for me?”

Misha smiled at him, and that was almost better than watching the sun rise from his bedroom window. “Sure. Nothing else?”

“Nothing else, thank you so much,” Jensen smiled back.

Misha going to work was always a bit strange, but only because of Jensen's general urge to hug and kiss him goodbye and wish him a good day at work.

And in those moments, Jensen rolled his eyes at himself and was almost thankful that he'd return to work soon because God, he totally turned into a housewife.

Which he was only reminded of when he found AJ sitting at the kitchen table in his baby seat, formula smeared all over his lips and chin and looking up at him with big, innocent eyes.

“C'mon, buddy, I think we two have an appointment with the bathtub,” Jensen chuckled as he picked up AJ and carried him to the bathroom.

***

“Hey, Jensen, I brought the- geez, you look like hell. What happened?” Misha burst out immediately when Jensen opened the door at around 3 p.m.

It wasn't like Jensen didn't know he looked like shit, and he felt worse. His stomach was churning and rumbling and he had almost vomited three times since he got home from his walk with AJ. “Glad to see you, too, Misha,” he said instead of all of this, sarcasm dripping from his every word. “Come on in.”

“Are you feeling sick?” Misha asked worriedly as he placed his spare hand on Jensen's forehead. “You're not burning up or anything, but you're pale as paper.”

“I'm not feeling too well, that's for sure,” Jensen said, groaning. No, talking didn't help. Jensen tried to breathe shallowly through his mouth. “No fever so far, but I'm...” A sudden lurch in his stomach made him burp a disgusting mouthful of bile, and he sent Misha off to the kitchen with a wave. Jensen knew he couldn't hold it off any longer.

The tile was cold and hard as he dropped to his knees in front of the toilet, barely managed to open the lid before he emptied his stomach into the bowl. He had to retch a few more times, but apart from his breakfast, there wasn't much more. He'd already felt too nauseous to fix himself some lunch.

Misha was at his side quickly, obviously just having placed the cartons of milk in the fridge before he ran right back to Jensen.

Which made a surprising thought hit Jensen, but he couldn't voice it yet, still too busy with catching his labored breath.

Misha's warm hand rubbed up and down the center of his back, soothing gently. “You alright?” he asked concerned and soft.

Jensen just nodded, then got to his feet to reach for his toothbrush and paste.

“Some stomach bug?” Misha guessed as he flushed and closed the toilet.

Jensen held up a finger, then brushed his teeth quickly. After he spat out the toothpaste, he shook his head. “No. I thought I'd finish the milk, you know, since you would bring some anyway. Made myself a bowl of cereal after I got home from walking AJ, and I still felt fine then. The milk was probably sour.”

“The milk was sour,” Misha huffed, then patted Jensen's back. “C'mon, let's get you into bed with a nice, big bucket.”

“But AJ-”

“I'll take care of AJ.”

“Don't you have work or...?”

“No, I don't. And if I had, then you would still be priority one,” Misha answered simply. “Don't worry about that.”

Jensen didn’t have much energy left to protest, and some sort of warmth in his chest made him all mushy, so he let Misha bundle him up and provide him with his cleaning bucket and a roll of paper towels. A few minutes later, Misha returned with a thermos of fennel tea and the order to “Rehydrate, that's important, doesn't matter if it stays down for now.”

After Jensen had drank half a mug only to vomit it up again, Misha smiled pityingly as he held the bucket for him. Misha emptied and cleaned it before bringing it back to Jensen, who had given up on drinking – eating was completely out of discussion for today, the thought alone made Jensen sick all over again – and Misha looked at him quizzically as he stood at the door.

“Are you gonna be fine for a moment?”

“Yeah, yeah,” Jensen sighed, his throat sore and his stomach still flipping uncomfortably.

“Call me if you need anything. I'll be in the living room, alright? Try to watch some TV, maybe?” Misha advised, his voice a quiet, calming rumble that sank right into Jensen's bones.

Jensen missed it already.

He flipped on the TV, but watching Fry crunch down on some shrimps – 'popplers' - on Futurama didn't help the situation in the least. Jensen grimaced and turned it off.

The fennel tea didn't start to taste any better when it turned colder, so Jensen took a tentative sip a while later.

It stayed where it was, for now, but Jensen still felt miserable.

AJ began to cry soon after, and it made Jensen's heart ache for him. If he hadn't been so dizzy, half-tired and half-too-weak-from-vomiting-his-guts-out, he'd get up and help Misha, but there was no way he was going anywhere in his current state.

Jensen's eyes widened in surprise when Misha entered his bedroom with a quiet, but awake AJ in his arms.

“I think someone misses his papa,” he grinned.

Jensen just hummed, but couldn't help but smile as Misha laid down AJ next to him, where the little one curled up against his side. “Hey, AJ. Don't worry, daddy just had to lie down for a bit.”

It had become kind of a thing between them, referring to Jensen as either daddy or papa respectively. Jensen guessed that it would only be settled when AJ spoke his first word and would end that debate once and for all.

As it was, the baby looked up at Jensen with confused eyes and a cheeky smile, and Jensen's heart melted a bit. “Look at him, quick,” Jensen whispered to Misha.

And Misha crouched down beside them, his head only inches away from Jensen's as AJ turned and smiled at him, too.

“Aw,” he cooed.

Jensen didn't even know whom he should watch at this point, AJ or Misha, because Misha's smile was just as tender and touched. He sighed.

“I guess I better leave you alone to sleep it off,” Misha added a few minutes later, with his head still beside Jensen's. 

Withing kissing distance, for fuck's sake, Jensen thought and had to remind himself again why this would be the worst idea he ever had. “Yeah, I'll try,” he croaked out instead.

And Misha still had that endearing smile on his face when he ran his hand through Jensen's short, tousled hair. Jensen let his eyes flutter shut and sighed deeply, savoring every moment of Misha taking care of him.

Yeah, Jensen was officially and completely gone.

“Sleep tight,” Misha said before heading out of the room and taking AJ with him.

“Thank you,” Jensen answered. “And I mean, for everything.”

Misha rolled his eyes fondly. “You're welcome. And for the record, this goes without saying.”

Sometime in the early evening, Jensen drifted off to sleep, throat sore from convulsing and his mind restless from his own inability to realize when food wasn't safe to eat any more.

And someone had deemed him fit to take care of a baby.

***

Jensen woke up when it was already dark outside, with a paper towel wadded in his fingers and the distinct taste of dead squirrel on his tongue.

At least, he was feeling a bit better.

Quiet, so he wouldn't disturb the probably sleeping baby, Jensen rolled out of bed to brush his teeth and flush his mouth with Listerine, the full thirty seconds. He had seen light in the living room when he crossed the hallway, so the silence in his apartment was a bit odd.

When Jensen stumbled down the hallway and entered the living room, the dim light of the floor lamp combined with the flickering of the muted TV was showcasing a picture that nothing could have prepared him for.

Misha slept on the recliner, AJ slumbering with his head cradled against his chest.

It was peaceful, and the small smile on Misha's lips only added to the twinge in Jensen's heart. AJ had his hand fisted into the collar of Misha's shirt, and Misha held him with one arm under his butt and the other hand splayed on the baby's back. Jensen's favorite fluffy blanket covered Misha, while AJ was wrapped in his own quilt.

And maybe he had tears in his eyes, because wasn't this everything he wanted right there? A man, careful and skilled, funny and smart, who probably took better care of his kid than himself. And his kid trusting that man to hold him through his sleep, hold him safe and warm and protect him.

Jensen leaned down and pressed a quick kiss to the back of AJ's head, overwhelmed by the onslaught of emotions churning his guts in the non-nausea causing way.

He spotted his phone on the living room table and decided that he needed to capture this moment somehow, even if it meant taking advantage. He'd just tell Misha later.

The picture was snapped quickly, but Jensen hadn't turned his phone to silent. The shutter sound of the camera made him wince.

Misha stirred, his eyes slowly blinking open. “Jay?” he asked blearily.

“Hey, Mish,” Jensen says, faking cheerfulness to hide that his voice was shaking.

“You're up.”

“Yeah, sorry, didn't mean to wake you,” Jensen said as he put his phone down on the table.

“You feeling better?”

“Yeah. Kinda hungry, actually. Just went to grab a bite.”

“That's great,” Misha smiled, then looked down at AJ on his chest. “I should probably get him into his crib.”

“Nah, just stay like that. Wouldn't wanna wake him,” Jensen chuckled. “Do you want a cup of tea or anything?”

“That would actually be awesome,” Misha grinned.

So Jensen went to the kitchen to fix them both a cup – green tea with lemon for Misha, more fennel for himself.

Misha accepted the tea with a mumbled “Thanks” as he balanced out AJ's weight on his remaining arm.

For a long while, they just sat in the silence of the living room, sipping at their tea occasionally. Jensen stole glances at Misha, whenever he was occupied with watching the news or just looking down at AJ.

He wanted to say it, let it all flow out, take it or leave it. How much he liked Misha, how much he wanted him in his life. How much his stomach turned at the thought that Misha might be straight, which in all fairness had never come up between them.

Jensen had long since stopped caring about what people thought about him or his sexuality. Most of his colleagues knew he was gay - not including Pete, because he was a homophobic asshole and everyone knew it so no one told him – since he had come out to them pretty nonchalantly. Mike had seen him at a bar where he had made out and left with a guy. It didn't matter that it was a one night stand, one of many at the time; people would start to talk and Jensen knew it, so he just cut that right off from the beginning.

Which got him thinking, now that he was sitting in his living room with Misha, because Misha was the first guy in years that he'd been hesitant towards when it came to admitting he was gay.

For reasons Jensen really didn't want to explore right now.

“I'll go heat up some soup,” he said instead and left Misha with AJ.

Tomato-rice was the only soup he still had in a Maggi package, so he set up some water to boil and only returned when the soup was done.

“You want some, too?” he asked at his return.

Misha only shook his head. “Nah, you eat.”

And as he slurped up the grains of rice from his spoon, Jensen sighed. “I can't believe the milk was sour,” was what came out mumbled. Because that was what had been bothering him all evening.

Not, 'by the way, I'm gay and totally into you', which had been what Jensen wanted to shout from the rooftop not ten minutes ago.

“It happens, Jensen. Leave it open for too long, milk will turn sour,” Misha joked, but failed to lift the mood. Jensen's, at least.

“No, I mean, here I am, a grown man being responsible for a baby of five months, and I don't even realize when food isn't safe for me anymore!”

The anger that welled up inside him was directed at himself and Jensen knew it. To say it out loud helped, even though Misha flinched a bit at the initial outburst.

Jensen let his spoon drop into the soup and cradled his face in his hands. “I don't even know anymore, man,” he choked through the first tears prickling at the edges of his eyes. “How am I supposed to take care of him when I can't even take proper care of myself?”

Furniture cracked, the sound of worn leather rubbing against itself, before Jensen felt the couch dip beside him. Misha leaned into his shoulder, providing silent comfort and a shoulder for Jensen to lean on in return.

Jensen didn't want to look at him right now, so he stared through the gaps between his fingers into his steaming soup.

“Honestly, sometimes I wish I wasn’t his dad. Just, pack my bags in the middle of the night and leave. Go as far away as I can and never come back. And I'm a horrible person for even thinking about it,” Jensen admitted meekly. He sniffed and wiped the tears down his cheeks, before stealing a glance from the corner of his eye.

Misha watched him with so much sadness, so much understanding, that a fresh set of tears made its way down Jensen's face immediately. Damnit. He wasn't one to cry, had never been one to cry before. But give him a baby and a guy he's hopelessly pining for and can't have, and there you go.

“No, you're not a horrible person for even thinking that, Jensen,” Misha stated quietly, although Jensen could make out an unmistakable wetness in the corner of those electric blue eyes as well. “It's normal. It's completely and utterly normal to feel like that.”

“You're just saying that,” Jensen huffed.

“No, I'm not. Seriously. Look it up online if you don't believe me. A lot of parents feel like that. Having a child in your life is a big change, a lot bigger than most parents think it is at first. You can be prepared, but you can never be prepared enough. It's new, and it's overwhelming, and half of the time you have no idea what you're doing and you just make it up as you go, but you know what? It's not like our own parents were any different. And look at us - we grew up, too.”

Jensen sniffled. “I don't wanna sound mean here, but... how would you know?”

Misha fell silent, his lips pressed to a thin line. “I just... trust me, I know.”

“Yeah, you've said that before. But you're amazing with the kid and you know all this stuff and when you tell me it's like you've actually _been there, done that_ , so why don't you-”

“Jensen, I really, really don't want to talk about it,” Misha grumbled in a tone so serious, so firm – and without even meeting Jensen's eyes - that Jensen didn't dare say another word about it.

“Fine,” Jensen gave in, too tired and hungry to argue. He could die as well from curiosity tomorrow, but he didn't want to push Misha. He would come around sooner or later, just as Jensen had come around sooner or later with the story of AJ's parents.

Just as he would come around to coming out to Misha some day.

Today was not that day, Jensen decided and finished his tomato rice soup.

When he leaned back and left the dirty dish on the coffee table without a care in the word, Misha wordlessly threw the fluffy blanket over him, too.

Misha sat beside him, his warmth bleeding over into Jensen, comforting and perfect.

When AJ woke them up about two hours later, Misha slipped out from under their shared blanket to prepare a bottle from him. Jensen only noticed it because that weight against his side was suddenly gone, leaving a cold spot on his shoulder where Misha's head had rested. He was too drowsy to protest, though.

Misha came back, without AJ, but carrying the baby monitor and putting it on the table.

Right before his shivering form was back at Jensen's side, under the blanket.

Right where he belonged.

Jensen gladly accepted the crick in his neck, because it would remind him all day of how he had slept on the couch with Misha, that he had heard his soft snores in his ear and felt the rise and fall of his chest against his arm. That some time during the night, Misha had entwined their fingers.

When AJ cried the next time, Jensen untangled himself from Misha carefully, only to find that AJ lost his pacifier.

Misha found Jensen a few minutes later in the nursery, as he rocked AJ back and forth on his arm to calm him down.

“You got him?” he asked sleepily.

Jensen nodded, “Yeah, he's already half asleep again.”

“Alright, then I'll just--” Misha waved towards the door, towards his own apartment.

 _Stay,_ Jensen wanted to shout out. _Stay here. Stay in my bed. Stay forever, I don't care, just stay._

He didn't say any of it, of course, because he was a coward.

“Wait,” he mumbled instead, shifting the still fussy AJ onto his right hip. Then Jensen walked up to Misha to wrap him up in a bone-crushing one-armed hug that was definitely longer than any norm of society deemed okay. “Thank you,” Jensen whispered, right into Misha's ear, and felt how the latter hesitated for a moment.

Just one single moment that made Jensen's heart skip a beat.

But then Misha raised his arms around his waist and clutched at the back of his shirt with a force Jensen hadn't expected. AJ ended up in the middle between their shoulders.

Jensen didn't want to let go. Like, at all. 

So when Misha finally pulled back, he almost wanted to sob. Misha stroked over his shoulder, his touch easy and tender, and Jensen apparently had missed the memo that casual contacts like these were common between them. He melted into it nonetheless.

“You're welcome,” Misha eventually replied, and it was spoken so heartfelt and with so much fondness that Jensen thought his stupid, way too fast beating heart would be the end of him any second now.

It wasn't.

But when the door fell closed behind Misha, the ache in Jensen's gut had nothing to do with the milk any more. He felt like Misha had taken a part of himself with him.

AJ's bottom lip trembled and he looked genuinely upset when he raised his eyes to Jensen's. Then they followed the track to the door Misha had just taken, and AJ made a half-way aborted grabby hand towards it. When he apparently realized that Misha wouldn't come back just like that, he bumped his head into Jensen's chest with a displeased huff and remained there.

“Me too, buddy,” Jensen sighed and kissed the soft hair on the back of his head before carrying AJ to his crib and himself to his bed.


	5. Chapter 5

Many things worked in mysterious ways these days; Jensen's libido was one of them. After having been apprehensively absent, Jensen woke up the following Saturday to a surprise.

For once, it wasn't AJ.

It was his morning wood pushing insistently against the mattress, and for the first time in almost half a year, Jensen had the urge to actually do something about it. With a groan, he rolled onto his back and pulled off his sweaty shirt. Dried come was the worst to get out of cotton, and Jensen fully intended to sleep a while longer after this.

Jensen made quick work of his boxer briefs, stripped them off and kicked them in the vague vicinity of the bed's foot end. The sheets were soft and warm against his hard cock, a fact that he hadn't been paying attention to in a while. But yes, back in the day, he had bought these sheets because they were exquisite to roll around in with someone else.

He tried not to dwell on the thought that his right hand had to make due, because any action, even if just from his own hand, was more than he had had for months.

His hand curled around the base of his dick and stroked up to the tip with practiced motion. Jensen gasped at the first touch – he was too oversensitive, too deprived of any manual stimulation, and too overwhelmed for a short moment. He rolled the head of his cock between his index finger and thumb, teasing himself a bit to get used to it again, before starting strong, urgent strokes up and down his length.

It was just what he needed in this moment.

How he hadn't done this for so long was a miracle to Jensen, considering the very real, very tempting jerk-off fantasy that lived right next door-

Yeah, he probably shouldn't think about Misha in a situation like this, but damn, did it work in his favor.

Jensen wondered what Misha would look like underneath his weird sweaters or the occasional button-down that he tended to fill out so deliciously. The guy was definitely muscular from all his running, Jensen was sure, in that lean kind of way that fit his figure so well. He probably didn't have a six-pack or defined pecs, but his skin would be taut over hard, flat muscles that Jensen would just love to trace with his fingers and mouth. His nipples would be dark and very sensitive to the touch, especially to Jensen's tongue, and he could imagine Misha making the sweetest little sighs at his caresses.

If he kept going like this, this wouldn't take too long.

With a moan, Jensen brought his left hand into the game, rolling his sack through his fingers.

Misha would take his time with him. Stroke him until he was two seconds away from coming, and then he'd stop, just to tease Jensen, to make him beg for it.

And God, yes, Jensen would beg gladly. For anything, really. Misha's hand, Misha's mouth, Misha's cock in his ass. Everything.

His strokes had become increasingly hard and frantic, his fingers tighter around his dick. The pressure was perfect right now, and just a few more pumps and he'd be there, just-

The doorbell rang and reminded Jensen just how desperate not getting laid in the past months had gotten him.

He groaned, low and oh so frustrated.

“Right up!” Jensen called out as he rolled out of bed, grumbling about never catching a break. Also, it wouldn't take long until AJ woke up once he heard voices in the hall. Just peachy.

Short of anything better to wear, Jensen grabbed yesterday's jeans and pulled them over his hips, his dick still achingly hard. But that had to wait until later, no matter how uncomfortable he was.

The zipper was rough and cold against his bare cock, which helped at least to clear his mind a bit.

However, that thought was long forgotten once Jensen opened the door to Misha, drenched in rainwater, curly hair plastered against his forehead.

“Morning,” Jensen smiled tightly, unable to keep some of all the pent-up frustration out of his voice.

Misha just stood there, both cups of coffee clutched to his wet chest, and looked stunned. His lips were slightly parted around a yet unvoiced retort and he managed to look both adorable and hot. Jensen silently damned his persistent erection, which was rather encouraged by Misha's appearance.

That was when he also realized what he looked like. Hair in a wild state of bedhead, shirtless, barefoot, and only dressed in some ratty old jeans that could use a wash and probably hung a bit too low on his hips. He really should've taken the belt, too. Sue him, it had slipped to the floor and Jensen was lazy.

“Mo-morning,” Misha stuttered for a moment, then shook his head almost imperceptibly. “I brought coffee!” he announced immediately after, thrusting the cup towards Jensen while staring at his own cup.

And if Jensen's eyes hadn't gotten worse, then Misha's cheeks were a bit flushed. Huh. Maybe the cold of the rain?

“Are you alright?”

“Yeah,” Misha said, too quick, before spinning on his heels and heading for his apartment.

“Thanks!” Jensen shouted after him, but didn't get a reply.

Instead, after Misha somehow managed to get the door unlocked – it looked like a pretty fumbled matter – he disappeared inside wordlessly. The door fell closed with a thump, which was followed by another sound that sounded suspiciously like a wet bag being dropped to the floor.

Jensen hummed and closed the door behind himself to lean against it.

He was by no means in the form he once was; he had admittedly gone a bit pudgy midway, but he had that awesome kind of metabolism and eating habits that kept him averagely fit anyway. Looking down at himself, at his perky nipples and flat belly and the trail of curly, light brown hair leading into the front of his pants, Jensen shrugged to himself. Well, there was no shame in admitting that he didn't look too bad. And if he had just managed to make Misha flustered, then he could gloat a bit, right?

Jensen leaned down, placed his cup of coffee on the floor beside the door.

He listened, but AJ seemed to still be very asleep.

Alright, time to finish what he started earlier, Jensen decided and opened his fly before he sat down with his back against the door. It seemed dirtier to do this here instead of in the shower or the privacy of his bed; here, he was probably closer to Misha on the other side of the building.

Jensen jerked off to the image of Misha sitting naked in his lap, cheeks flushed red and lips parted as their cocks rubbed against each other's, Misha's a bit shorter but thicker than his own, and framed with crude, dark hair at the base. Hair that Jensen would love to bury his nose in, a cock he'd love to have down his throat. Just to hear Misha groan and writhe above him.

Needless to say, it didn't take Jensen long. He finished uninterrupted this time and came with a silent moan, his back arching unconsciously off the wooden door as hot spurts hit his chest and stomach. God, that had been necessary. So, so necessary.

Jensen sat there, on the cold, hard tiled floor, catching his breath for a moment while letting the come drip from his hand onto his stomach. He licked the last of it off his index finger, the flavor strong because it had been so long. Coffee had to be enough to wash it down, although Jensen kind of wished it wasn't his own come, and kind of wished he could taste said someone's on his tongue a little longer than that.

Then he got to his feet to wash up and make breakfast. AJ woke up while Jensen was busy chopping some fruit, and when Misha came around for breakfast – later than usual - he couldn't quite look into Jensen's eyes.

Jensen wondered why that was, but kept his thoughts and his probably presumptuously smug smirk to himself.

***

The following week was pure and utter torture.

After getting the not-so-subtle hint, Jensen's hormones were back to working overtime. He felt like a teenager all over again, popping a boner at the slightest occasion.

Which were, unsurprisingly, all connected to Misha.

It was embarrassing.

While Jensen had noticed before that Misha was attractive and cute and had a dangerous twinkle in his eyes sometimes, it hadn't really bothered him. It was part of why he'd fallen for him in the first place.

Now, though, Jensen picked up all kinds of stuff.

The way Misha's hips swayed from side to side when he walked. The way he closed his fingers around his keys or AJ's bottle. The way his damn plush lips pulled into a smirk sometimes.

The bulge in his jeans one morning.

Often enough, as soon as Misha was out the door and AJ was sleeping, Jensen found himself on his couch or in the shower or wherever he just happened to stand, pulling off his pants and stripping his cock until he came hard and fast to the image of Misha on his knees in front of him. Or vice versa. Or anything that involved Misha's dick anywhere near himself, preferably in his ass.

***

The days had gotten increasingly warmer as June approached, and on a Sunday walk through the park, Misha asked the question that Jensen had been mulling over for a while now.

“Isn't your paternity leave over soon?”

“Yeah,” Jensen sighed. “I've only got three more weeks at home.”

“What are you gonna do then?”

“I have an appointment with my boss this week. You know, to try and convince him of letting me work from home and with a bit lighter workload for a start,” Jensen chuckled.

They stopped in mutual agreement at the next bench, where they sat down to relax in the shade of the tree behind it. It was already late afternoon, but the earth was so heated up from the searing midday sun that it only started to become tolerable half an hour ago.

Misha squinted at him, the aviators on his nose making him look ridiculously hot. “You think it's gonna work?”

Jensen shrugged. “I hope so. I mean, he likes me. And he'll probably make me go in for work once or twice a week, I know that. Guess I'll have to look for a babysitter, then.”

“Probably, yeah,” Misha grinned. “Just tell me if you need help?”

“Will do,” Jensen smiled at him, and when Misha smiled back, Jensen had to avoid his eyes. It was like staring into the sun, as clicheed as that sounded.

AJ began to jabber, and Jensen gladly shifted his attention towards him. “Oh, look who's up! What're you saying, little one?” he cooed and held his hands out so AJ could curl his tiny fingers around his hands. “You wanna come over? To daddy?”

_And there goes Misha's bad influence,_ Jensen thought amused as he picked up AJ and sat him onto his lap.

“Papa,” Misha corrected with a pointed look at Jensen, then stroked AJ's cheek to get him to look at him. “Did you hear that, AJ? Your papa still doesn't remember that his name is papa, not daddy.”

“Aaah,” AJ just said and grabbed for Misha's face, who let the boy feel up the scruff on his cheek patiently.

Oh, what Jensen would give to have that privilege, too.

Apparently, he was jealous of a baby now.

AJ's giggling threw him off that train of thought, and Jensen found Misha looking at him. His eyes shone with sincerity and fondness, which made Jensen's stomach do what felt like a somersault or two.

Jensen couldn't handle any of it, so he distracted himself by playing plane with AJ and letting him fly over into Misha's arms. Admittedly just to see the two of them cuddled up, because AJ began to be suspicious of strangers now, but Misha had long since stopped being a stranger to him.

At the very least, Jensen considered Misha and himself to be good friends at this point.

The point was also that when Misha played with AJ, Jensen had all the time in the world to stare at them and listen to his heart pump so loud in his chest that it was a miracle Misha had never heard it, too.

***

“And, what did they say?”

“I have to come in on Mondays and Thursdays for the team meetings. Other than that, I work from home,” Jensen answered over the dinner table, still feeling relieved and triumphant from his meeting with his boss. “And I can still work full-time.”

“That's awesome!” Misha exclaimed, obviously excited for Jensen's sake, which was just adorable.

“Yeah, and now I've got two weeks to find a babysitter for those two days.”

***

Jensen had been doing interviews for three days straight now, and he was frustrated. The one who had to listen to his whining was obviously Misha.

“You know, it's really hard to find a nanny who didn't just stop being jailbait a month ago and tries to hit on the single dad with the cute kid,” Jensen rambled as he turned his back on Misha and grabbed a sterilized bottle and the box of formula from the kitchen cabinet. “I'm gay, for Christ's sake, so thrusting your tits in my face won't get you the job.”

For a second, Jensen froze. _Shit._ Well, that hadn't been the way he would've preferred to come out to Misha, but... it happened. And now it was out there.

Thank God.

Jensen, however, didn't dare turn around to check Misha's reaction. Nothing could prepare him for what he'd see if Misha found that disgusting. Or, almost as bad, if hope flared up in his eyes, giving Jensen all kinds of ridiculous ideas.

Misha, however, only chuckled teasingly behind him. “And I suppose it isn't easy to find a male nanny?”

“Hey, don't get me wrong, it's not like I would take advantage either way,” Jensen shook his head, but grinned. _It's not like my thoughts and fantasies don't all center around you and no one else these days._

Thank God, again, that Misha took his coming out in stride.

After a short pause, Misha cleared his throat. “So you need the nanny for two days a week?”

“Monday and Thursday,” Jensen repeated on a sigh as he filled the kettle with water.

“I could watch him, if you're okay with that. I mean, he already knows me. And I work from home mostly, so that's not a problem.”

Jensen faced him to shoot an inquiring, surprised look at Misha. “You'd do that?”

“Sure. It's really not a hardship, if you're thinking that. I can easily make it work. And you don't have to pay me anything.”

“Ah, no, no. I can't _not_ pay you, that'd be--”

“Jensen, I like that kid. I'd love to spend more time with him,” Misha answered solemnly.

Jensen nodded, biting his lip. He wasn't opposed to the idea in the least; in fact, he was pretty happy that Misha offered it himself. What he was afraid of was being even more connected to the other man, giving him an even bigger part in AJ's life than he already had.

“Thanks, Mish,” he said eventually, the noise of the kettle covering the fact that his voice was not as stable as it used to be. “You really wouldn't need to, you know. You're already doing so much for us.”

“Yeah, and you know why?” Misha grinned cockily as he stepped over to lean against the counter beside Jensen. He picked up the kettle after it boiled and nudged his hip against Jensen's, seemingly random but obviously on purpose.

Jensen felt his heart almost skip a beat when Misha leaned into his personal space, eyes looking past him at the bottle that he filled with the warm water.

So close.

He was so damn close.

Jensen could reach out with his arm, grab him around the waist, pull him in for a kiss.

Misha looked up at him, his full lips curled into a smile and his blue eyes sparkling mischievously. For a quick moment, said eyes dropped to Jensen's bottom lip that was still pulled between his teeth. Suddenly feeling self-conscious, Jensen let it slip free and licked over the sore spot on it reflexively.

He hadn't been as hard in his pants for months as he was now, looking at Misha.

That's when he remembered that Misha had prompted him with a question.

“Um, why?” Jensen rasped out, his voice shot to hell from arousal.

“Because,” Misha started, eyebrows risen as he shook the bottle in his hand, mixing the formula with water. “If you haven't noticed, you two are kinda awesome and I kinda like you. Like, a tiny bit. Enough to want to spend more time with you.”

And with that and a wink, Misha left the kitchen, testing the temperature of the formula on his wrist as he went.

When he was sure that Misha was a safe distance away, Jensen palmed his aching dick through the thick fabric of his jeans and moaned silently.

After taking a deep breath, he followed Misha to the nursery, where he found him sitting in the beanbag chair. AJ tried to reach up and support the bottle he was given with his own little hands, but Misha was still the one who held it for him, smiling down at the boy cradled in his arms.

Jensen's heart skipped another beat, but for a very different reason.

***

“I swear to God, he's driving me nuts, Mack,” Jensen groaned into the phone two days later.

“Aw, trouble in paradise?” his sister chuckled through the tinny speaker.

“No, it's just – for Christ's sake, he showed up _shirtless_ this morning.”

“It's the middle of summer in Texas, running around shirtless in your apartment shouldn't really be a crime, don't you think? Also, why are you even complaining?” Mack sounded too unimpressed for Jensen's taste.

“Because it makes me horny, okay, and I have a kid here, and I _can't_ , alright?” Jensen hissed, frustrated and angry.

“You need to get laid, big brother.”

“Yeah, as if that's my only problem.”

Mack fell silent for a moment.

“How's AJ doing?”

Jensen smiled to himself before he huffed, “He's teething. Which means more crying and screaming. And he started to crawl and my apartment is apparently full of death traps for six month old babies.”

“He crawls? Oh my God! How did he-”

Jensen rolled his eyes and rattled the story off quickly. “Not much to it. Misha and I sat on the couch and I had him sitting on my lap and then he just ducked under my arm, to the side, and started to crawl towards Misha.”

“That was a bit fast, Jay, but I think I got the point – you're jealous because he crawled towards your boyfriend instead of you?” Mack teased, but she wasn't so wrong.

Jensen snorted. “Kinda. I'll totally take revenge when he starts walking, although that'll take a few more months.”

“Did you just-” Mackenzie began, but didn't finish the sentence.

Then Jensen noticed his mistake and sighed. “He's not my boyfriend, obviously.”

“Your own fault,” Mack chirped way too cheerfully. “Do you still not know if he's straight or not?”

“No, I don't. But he knows I'm gay, because I let that slip during a rant a few days ago,” Jensen said, then rubbed his eyes with his index finger and thumb. “Freudian slip.”

“Totally not on purpose?”

“No.”

“Yeah, right.”

Jensen hesitated. “Alright, alright. Maybe I sort of played with the thought before, and when I actually talked to him, it just... I just said it.”

“And what did he say?”

“Nothing, like, at all.”

“And that he runs around shirtless these days, don't you think that's enough of a reaction?”

“You think? Nah. He's usually more straightforward than this.”

“You're usually a lot more _gay_ forward than this,” Mackenzie deadpanned with a barely hidden laugh.

Jensen groaned. “That was so bad, Mack, I'm not even gonna comment on it.”

“Still, it's true and you know it.”

“I do,” Jensen sighed, remembering all the guys he'd had over for one night stands barely months ago. It had never been a problem to communicate the fact that he was gay, even if that included one drunk and incredibly eloquent, 'Hey, I'm gay and you're hot, wanna fuck?' in a club one day. Which, for the record, had been a successful night.

“And hey, if you need some help from your sister again, I'd have an idea or two.”

“God, please, no.”

This time, it was Mackenzie that sighed heavily into the speaker.

“Just, don't make yourself miserable over this, please?” she asked concerned.

Jensen bit his lip, thinking about her words. Thinking about how Misha had carried around AJ on his naked chest – that was just as muscled and toned as Jensen had thought – this morning. Thinking about the leap in his heart and the twitch of his cock at the picture. Then he shrugged to himself. “Honestly, I'm pretty good right now.”

“Except for the whole pining and longing thing.”

“Yeah, except that.”

“Listen, Jay, I need to go study. Take care of yourself.”

“You too.”

“And at least think about telling him.”

“Yeah, yeah.”

“Bye, big bro.”

“Bye, squirt.”

***

The first day at work after half a year of staying at home was hard.

Not that Jensen had any worries leaving AJ with Misha for the day, but letting him go and diving back into a world without changing diapers and getting a baby to drink up his bottle was... difficult. No one seemed to care much about the change in his private life, and after the classic “How's the kid?” no one asked any further. Jensen felt unsettled, because AJ was in fact everything he's been talking about for the past months. The realization hit him when he set up his desk – not the old one, they had transferred him into a new department and equipped him with a laptop that he could take home.

His colleagues were happy to see him, and it was refreshing to meet them. Jensen felt good, all in all, to see that familiar part of the world again. However, his thoughts drifted off to home and AJ and Misha frequently. What they might do right now, if AJ was taking his lunch nap right now, if Misha burped him the way AJ liked it best. He had to make himself snap back to reality each time.

At lunchtime, Jensen shot off a quick text to make sure they were okay, and Misha answered by sending him a picture of AJ with carrot pulp smeared all over the lower half of his face and a laugh that showed off the one tooth he already had.

And when Jensen came home, Misha was standing in the doorway with AJ perched against his hip and a huge smile on his lips. Jensen could already smell the pot of chili cooking on the stove, and warmth uncurled in his stomach, captured his heart and made it swell impossibly.

“AJ, I think papa is home,” Misha said to the kid, who yelped and clapped his hands excitedly, then tried to eat his fist.

_God, they're adorable_ , Jensen thought.

Upon greeting them, he almost leaned in and planted one on Misha. Jensen realized what he was doing sometime halfway into Misha's bubble of personal space, his lips already slick from wetting them, and disguised the awkward moment with kissing the top of AJ's head instead.

Misha watched him a bit spooked, lips parted on a short intake of breath, but there was something else shining in his eyes, too. Jensen just couldn't put his finger on it.

“How was work today, hon?” Misha asked teasingly as Jensen put down his rucksack, obviously to distract them from the weird moment.

It reeked uncomfortably of domesticity, but Jensen couldn't help but enjoy it.

“A bit... ah, scratch that, a lot weird,” Jensen shook his head. “I guess I'm not used to a world where changing diapers and making formula is not priority number one any more.”

Misha chuckled and led the way to the kitchen, AJ still in his arms.

After Jensen had disposed of his shoes and laptop bag, he followed. AJ was already seated in his baby chair at the kitchen table, and Misha was bent over the pot on the stove.

They had dinner in silence, only broken by a few appreciative moans and nods by Jensen. He loved Misha's chili, had loved it since the first time Misha had made it for him a few months ago.

Later, they curled up on the couch with AJ sitting between them and playing with the latest toy Mack had sent him – a crocheted Goomba – and chatted about AJ's doings of the day, about Jensen's way back into the workday routine, until AJ crawled into Jensen's lap and fell asleep against his belly.

Which was when Jensen caught Misha watching the little boy with so much adoration, so much _love_ , that he should have been scared. He wasn't, though.

He told himself he wasn't.

And when Misha left, hours later, AJ began to cry immediately, even though he calmed down quickly.

Jensen understood all too well where he was coming from.

He felt lonely, too, when Misha wasn't there.

***

“You should start dating again,” Mack answered, unfazed, when he told her the next day.

“Oh, come on. That's not the ultimate solution to everything and you know it, so don't try to sell it to me,” Jensen rocked a fussing AJ in his one spare arm and rolled his eyes.

“No, really. You should get out more, meet people.”

“I don't have the time.”

“Ask Misha. Since you persistently refuse to ask him out, he'll babysit gladly.”

Jensen groaned. “Yeah, because that's such a good lead up to 'Oh by the way, I'm kinda in love with you'.”

“Jay, it's either this or _telling him_ that you are in love with him,” Mack replied softly. “Tell him or move on, but any more of this will break you.”

A sigh was all Jensen could manage in answer to that. AJ's eyes were teary and red when he looked up at Jensen through his lashes, and he still tried to weasel his way out of Jensen's grip.

“Look, I know you're scared to lose Misha. And I hate to say this, but have you thought about... there's no sympathetic way to say this – that you're focusing on him so much because he's the only guy in your life right now?”

“I don't even know anymore, Mack,” Jensen sighed again, defeated.

“So there are three things that could happen if you start dating again. One, you fall in love with someone else, someone who's actually interested in you and pursues a relationship, and you're happy and you move on. Two, you don't fall in love with him but at least you see that there's still a world out there, with a lot of guys that are very much interested in you. A kid is not the dealbreaker you think it is, Jay. Or three, Misha gets jealous and fights for you.”

“It's not like he couldn't do that already and he doesn't,” Jensen huffed frustrated.

“Yes, but think about your current situation,” Mackenzie interrupted. “You've just started work again, you've got a little kid at home, hell, he has only known you're gay for three weeks. Maybe he doesn't want to put more on your shoulders than you can stomach right now. I'd probably do the same.”

“Yeah, probably.”

“So as long as you don't signal that you're ready for a relationship, he'll wait. And if you show that you're interested in guys again – by dating – and he doesn't do shit about it, then you know that he wasn't interested in the first place.”

Jensen rubbed his eyes with the back of his hand, holding the phone between his cheek and shoulder. “That doesn't change the fact that I don't have any time to meet someone.”

“You know, I actually know someone. Met him here on campus, and he said he was just visiting and hailed originally from Dallas. Why don't you give him a call?”

“And why exactly should I do that? Go on a blind date set up by my little sister, that is.”

“Because he's tall, he's got dark hair, and he's got blue eyes. Very smart and good-looking. Just your type. And I know for sure he's gay.”

Reluctantly, Jensen grabbed the notepad next to the phone station to scribble down the number Mackenzie rambled off at the other end of the line, if just to make her shut up.

He pinned the number to the front of the fridge, unable and unwilling to decide if he would call at all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, as you might have noticed, there's a number instead of the ? at the chapter counter now. This fic will officially have 9 chapters, and they're finished and waiting to be beta'd. :)


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Some of you might have noticed the added tags and pairing in the description of this story. I know some of you will hate me for what's happening in this chapter, but I just have a really, really bad lady boner for Tom Welling since I started watching Smallville. I mean, just look at him. The guy's gorgeous.
> 
> So, uh. Sorry, not sorry. And I promise this is temporary.

It took Misha two weeks, but when they settled on the couch for the night one Friday, he burst out with a question that Jensen had long since forgotten.

“I know it's none of my business, but um...” Misha trailed off, scratching the back of his neck. “I couldn't help but notice. Who's Tom?”

“Uh,” Jensen answered intelligently, mulling it over and coming up with nothing. “Good question, actually. Which Tom?”

“The Tom whose number is pinned to your fridge?” Misha explained, but the frown on his face was unsettling. “Sorry, I'm not trying to be nosy. I'm just curious.”

That was when the penny dropped. “Oh, right. _That_ Tom.”

The point was, Jensen hadn't called him yet, didn't even know if he wanted to, but in case he made up his mind, he'd left the number right there. Of course Misha would see it, which was just his luck.

So he could lie to Misha or he could go for broke and just be honest.

And with Misha, he didn't really want to lie and hide. Additionally, his sister was right. As soon as Misha knew about Tom, the ball would be in his court.

Jensen shot an apologetic smile at Misha. “Mack met him a while ago. She wants me to go on a date with him, but I have no idea who the guy even is. I haven't called him yet.”

“Yet, as in... you're still going to call him?” Misha's frown deepened, and Jensen also didn't miss how his lips thinned to a taut line.

Huh.

“I don't know, man,” Jensen shook his head. “Maybe it'd be good, you know, to meet new people. But I haven't had a relationship in so long, I don't even know if I miss it. And dating has never been my specialty.”

“So, your last boyfriend...?”

“In college. Didn't last long, I caught him cheating on me. I was heartbroken for a while, and when I dove back into the dating pool, I found out that one night stands fit the bill just right and are a lot more convenient. The only thing that’s changed since then is AJ,” Jensen shrugged. _And the dry spell of the past six months,_ he added mentally.

Misha nibbled on his lower lip, but only for a few moments. “You think you're ready for dating and-slash-or a relationship again?”

“Like I said, I'm still thinking about it. Probably. I mean, it would be awesome to raise AJ together with someone else,” Jensen mumbled before he realized that he kind of insulted Misha and his place in AJ's life. “I mean, you know--” he tried to backpedal immediately.

“I know,” Misha interrupted him, and he sounded too bitter to not be hurt. “You're looking for a partner, not a babysitter.”

Jensen was speechless for a short second. His mind was racing a mile a minute, coming up with volatile thoughts like _I want you, and not as AJ's babysitter_ , and he still had no idea what to answer. Eventually, he took a deep breath and started to explain.

“I just want him to grow up with a second parent. It's unusual enough that he'll have to make due with two daddies, but I think being raised by a single dad is... not worse, but-” Jensen eventually threw his hands into the air, the unsaid words on the tip of his tongue just out of reach.

Misha reached for his glass of wine and almost downed half of it in one go. “Again, I know what you mean,” he said after swallowing heavily. He avoided Jensen's look by staring down into the whirling fluid in his glass. “I think I wouldn't want that, either.”

Jensen bit down on his bottom lip so hard that he tasted iron and blood after a while. Again, he should be honest with Misha. There wasn't a way to tell him about his feelings, but that didn't mean that Jensen should be an asshole about this.

“Misha, look at me,” he begged softly. _Tell me you'd want to be that person._

When Misha turned towards him, his face was blank and unreadable, but his eyes too blue and too filled with emotions to hide his inner turmoil.

“For the record, I didn't mean to devalue you in any way,” Jensen stated solemnly. “AJ clearly loves you. And I wouldn't know what to do without you in his and my life.”

 _That's about as sappy as it's gonna get,_ Jensen thought and sighed.

Misha eyed him with a pleading look, although Jensen couldn't quite place his finger on what he was pleading for. “Alright,” was everything he said before clapping Jensen's shoulder, signaling that the feelings talk was over.

Not that Jensen hadn't got it. He knew that Misha's defense was a thick wall, built over months, steel-reinforced and carefully maintained.

There was a crack in the wall, though. Jensen had seen glimpses through it – when Misha congratulated him on his birthday, when AJ had slept on Misha's chest in the living room while Jensen was sick, when he made the infamous 'Trust me, I know.' comment that Jensen still couldn't get out of his head. There were bits and pieces of someone Misha didn't want to be, not anymore at least, and he carefully kept that part of himself under wraps, buried under cement foot-high.

It was frustrating to know that, because Jensen would really want to get to know the Misha underneath.

“I think you should go on that date,” Misha said and effectively threw Jensen off his train of thought.

“Really?” Jensen burst out, almost shocked by how okay with it Misha sounded and how not okay he was to hear that.

“Yes,” Misha nodded.

For a second, Jensen could've sworn that his lips trembled, just like his voice. But maybe that was just him.

***

Jensen didn't call Tom. Not right away, anyway.

No, because he was stupid and this Tom guy wasn't who he wanted to go on a date with, not really, because he apparently transformed into a teenage girl some time between feeding AJ and going to work, and because he was hung up on Misha like he hadn't been hung up on anyone ever before.

Which was more disturbing than Jensen ever thought.

But it was Misha.

Wonderful, gentle, awesome Misha who had that sneaky sense of humor that would still – after six months of knowing him – catch Jensen off guard and make him double over with laughter.

The same Misha who was weirdly quiet during the following week.

Jensen had decided to give him a week. It was the least he could do. A week to see if Misha would react or fight for him in any way, a week to wait for Misha to say if he even was into men or into Jensen, or just do one damn thing at all about it.

Jensen waited that week.

And Misha just grew quieter and quieter each day, which Jensen first thought was a good sign, since Misha seemed to ponder about it. But apart from the occasional odd glance, Jensen got nothing out of him.

“Are you okay?” Jensen asked him over dinner on Thursday night.

Misha just stared some more into space and chewed.

“Mish, hey,” Jensen said again, louder. “What's up?”

“Huh?” Misha seemed perplexed and irritated and shook his head reflexively. “What? Nothing.”

“Are you okay?” Jensen repeated, starting to feel worried.

Misha shrugged dismissively, which didn't calm down Jensen in the least. “Sure.”

Jensen didn't call him out on the lie. It was obvious that whatever was bothering him, Misha didn't want to tell him, and Jensen couldn't make him. If he had a problem with Jensen going on a date, then he should say so, because he was a fucking grown-ass man who could speak his mind if he wanted to.

After that week – and a day, for good measure – Jensen picked up the phone one evening.

AJ had been sleeping for half an hour, so Jensen didn't expect any disruption within the next two hours.

Now or never, he thought, mixed feelings towards both Misha and mystery Tom aside.

On the fourth ring – Jensen's heart was racing faster and faster with each one, so he almost sighed a 'Hallelujah' into the speaker and hello, wouldn't that have been the pick-up line of the year? - Tom answered.

“Welling?”

“Uh, hi. Am I speaking to Tom?” Jensen burst out while forcing a smile onto his lips.

“You are,” a confused, but very enticing deep voice answered.

“It's... my name is Jensen, I'm Mackenzie's older brother?”

The no longer confused, and even more enticing deep voice began to laugh. “Oh, right. Yeah. She asked me about you again when we were chatting the other day.”

“So uh... she's pestering you just like she's pestering me?” Jensen bit his lip in order not to sound too flippant.

“I'd say so,” Tom hummed amused.

Jensen was quiet for a short moment, but then decided that he didn't need to beat around the bush anymore. It was pretty obvious why he called. “So, you wanna have coffee some time?”

Tom didn't answer for a second, and Jensen almost thought he'd say No. “Nothing against coffee, but... uh, Mackenzie told me you're working at Texas Instruments? I'm working just down the street from their building. We could meet up for lunch if you want?”

“Yeah, sure. I'll be at work again the day after tomorrow. You okay with Jim's?” Jensen suggested, knowing that he wouldn't be able to date someone who couldn't enjoy steak or a burger every once in a while, least of all from Jim's BBQ and grill. 

“In fact, I'd have suggested the same place,” Tom chuckled instead, and Jensen wasn't ashamed to admit that he liked his voice a lot. If Tom was anything like his voice promised in real life, this would be a very enjoyable lunch date.

“Great. I'll make reservations, then,” Jensen offered, smiling genuinely now. “I'll wear jeans and a green tie.”

“Suit, blue tie,” Tom answered. “Don't judge me, I'm a lawyer.”

“Alright then. I'll see you on Thursday.”

“See you, Jensen.”

And the way his name rolled off Tom's tongue, with that tidbit of suggestive hint-hint nudge-nudge, was admittedly making Jensen's toes curl.

Then again, Misha generally achieved that same feeling with a simple look.

***

Jensen tried not to gloat, he did. But he didn't manage it all the way.

If Misha noticed his weirdly wide smile one time or another, then he didn't say anything. He didn't ask – hadn't asked for the whole past week, in fact – when Jensen's date would be, if he'd need to extend his babysitting duties. He just acted like nothing was different.

Jensen felt uneasy, unbalanced, like the foundation of his life was suddenly crooked.

But he couldn't help Misha. Not if he didn't say anything.

Jensen could have a date with Tom all he wanted, it didn't change the fact that Misha would only need to snap his fingers and Jensen would cancel dinner and the reservation and would tell Tom that he was happily taken.

The problem was that the snap never came.

***

“So Mack tells me you've got a little kid?”

“Yeah, my nephew. Mack's nephew too, for that matter. He's seven months old and I'm raising him after our brother's accident,” Jensen answered, then took another bite of salad. Tom most likely knew all this, but hell – they were getting to know each other.

“I heard what happened. I'm so sorry,” Tom nodded, obviously worried to have brought the mood down. 

“I'm just glad that at least AJ gets to live his life, you know,” Jensen trailed off, then straightened his shoulders and looked Tom in the – very blue, very intense, very beautiful – blue eyes. “Do you like kids?”

The question was blunt and Jensen knew it, but he learned a thing or two in the past months.

The time for one night stands and sleeping with guys whose names he didn't remember when he kicked them out later with a ten dollar bill for the taxi was definitely over. He had a kid now. And come what may, AJ and him were a package deal, and that part was not negotiable.

“I love kids, but uh... I guess you know how it is. I don't expect to ever have any,” Tom said quietly, but then looked up at Jensen with a toothy grin and a wink. “Except...”

And yeah, Jensen might be hung up on Misha as fuck, but damn... Tom was serious competition. He was taller than Jensen, and even though Jensen never had much of a size kink going on, there was something about Tom. Something about the way he had had to tilt his head back and look up at him when they first met in front of the restaurant. Which may or may not be connected to the steel blue eyes and dark curly hair, who knew. Tom had a sweet smile and an easy kind of humor – he was the kind of person that had no problem coaxing Jensen out of his shell, which meant a thing or two.

So, yes, Jensen could see where this could go if they wanted it to.

There wasn't any tiptoeing around each other, no testing the waters. They both knew they were gay, they were on a lunch date and from the moment they had sat down at the table, Jensen felt the spark. The one that said there could be more. Ever since then, Tom hadn't held back much. He was flirting shamelessly, made Jensen blush at first and flirt back not soon after.

Three sentences into their conversation, he had looked up shyly and coughed. “Mack told me about you, but um... I'm kind of embarrassed to say and please don't think I'm shallow, but-- Holy shit, she wasn't kidding when she said you were good-looking.”

Jensen had grinned. “That kind of doesn't sound like my little sister.”

And seeing as the ice had been broken with that, the rest of their lunch went smoothly.

It was nothing like the past seven months had been with Misha.

Of course, Jensen was aware that his mood had shifted gradually, from depression because of Josh, then because of AJ, towards coping with the situation. There wasn't that dead weight of insecurity laying on his shoulders any more. He certainly appeared more confident, too, which was always a good look on anyone.

The difference with Tom was that Jensen knew exactly where he was standing, and that was refreshing. After having made some small talk, Tom had blatantly stated, “I know it's a bit much for having known me for a whole ten minutes, but I've been hurt in the past for not making this crystal clear from the beginning. I'm not a love 'em, leave 'em kinda guy. If I'm in, I'm in for the long haul, and you deserve to know that.”

“Alright, fair enough,” Jensen had swallowed heavily, because he knew all to well that he wasn't playing a fair hand here, “I'm still getting used to the idea, but yeah. Me too.”

“Great,” Tom had smiled, wide and genuine, and that smile right there had lifted Jensen's heavy heart immediately.

He almost felt guilty for having such a blast on a first date that wasn't even with Misha.

But Tom at least didn't hesitate to show that he was interested, too.

Which led to them standing, hidden from unwanted glances, in the shadow of the entrance of the Texas Instrument's office building, a bit too close to each other.

It was the kind of proximity that Misha held constantly, that Jensen didn't even question anymore with him, just had to control his itching fingers from grabbing Misha and hauling him in for a kiss.

Damn, this wasn't a good time to think about Misha, because Tom just asked him something murmured and probably husky and sexy.

“Huh?” Jensen chased, eyes fixed on Tom's lower lip.

“I said,” Tom repeated patiently and with a teasing smile, “Do you kiss on the first date?”

“Why wouldn't I?” Jensen raised an eyebrow, a smirk tugging at the edge of his lips.

“Thank God,” Tom sighed, then tipped Jensen's chin up to plant a single, firm kiss on Jensen's lips. It was dry and quick, but just right in every way.

Jensen's nerves and hormones decided to go nuts that very second, and the tingling on his lips was only getting worse, even long after Tom had left to head down the street.

It felt like betrayal.

And yet, it felt so good to see that other men were still interested in him. 

***

“So how was your date?” Misha asked over the cutting board where he prepared tomatoes for their dinner salad.

He hit Jensen right where he didn't expect it, so Jensen just stood there, baffled. “I-- how did you know?”

“Aw please, you're not fooling anyone, Ackles,” Misha said with a fond roll of his eyes that didn't hide the snide bitterness of the comment in the least.

At this point, Jensen realized three things in some kind of mini-epiphany. One, Misha was his best friend. Like, actually, his best friend in the whole wide world right now, and he could look right through him. Two, despite being his best friend, Misha still didn't see that Jensen was totally in love with him. Three, he seemed to be upset by the date, but Jensen didn't want to get his hopes up. It could have so many reasons why Misha wasn't comfortable with Jensen starting to date Tom, and if he didn't tell Jensen, how should he know?

Jensen let it go and shrugged. “Alright. It was awesome, actually. Tom's a pretty nice guy.”

“ _Pretty nice?_ That's what you're going with?” Misha huffed, his lips pressed to a thin line.

“Yeah, I mean. He likes kids, he's good looking, he's a successful lawyer... I guess I could do worse,” Jensen tried to joke, but apparently failed in doing so.

Misha just seemed to fall into a sour mood. “You could, yeah. Still, until I've met him, I'm convinced you can always do better,” he snapped.

Jensen raised an eyebrow. “Okay, what's crawled up your ass and died today?”

“What? Nothing.”

“Yeah, it doesn't sound like nothing.”

“It's nothing,” Misha insisted, then turned around to dump the sliced tomatoes into the salad bowl and to stir the pasta sauce on the stove.

Jensen knew when he'd been dismissed, so he didn't push further, no matter how much he wanted to and how much he hated to see Misha like this.

***

Their second date was an honest-to-god coffee shop, after-work date and a spontaneous one at that. Which Jensen was thankful for, since it spared him the fussing about his clothes and whatnot. 

Tom had simply texted him some time after lunch, asking if he wanted to go for coffee later.

And Jensen had only felt a little bad to call home and ask Misha if it was okay that he would come home a bit later than planned.

Misha had sighed, and Jensen didn't need to tell him why he would come home late.

But when Jensen met Tom in front of the coffee shop, he could easily push that heavy sigh aside. Tom looked more than happy to see him, a wide smile on his full lips and a shy brush of his hand against Jensen's bicep, as if he wasn't sure which kind of greeting was okay. Jensen quickly decided that for both of them by leaning in and kissing Tom on the lips.

Which resulted in an adorable blush rising on Tom's cheeks.

So, yeah, Jensen liked him. A lot.

It wasn't like he was in love with Tom or anything, but he could wrap his mind around dating him and the rest would come eventually, anyway.

They talked through an hour and two cups of coffee each, and Tom managed to wrap his foot around Jensen's under the table after some 20 minutes. It had taken Jensen by surprise, but then he had rubbed his toes against Tom's ankle and despite feeling like a lovesick teenager, it also felt incredibly good. Tom smiled shyly and cast his eyes down, and Jensen wanted to kiss him again.

And with Tom, he actually could. 

“So, when will I see you again?” Tom asked when he walked Jensen to the railway stop.

“Well, do you have any plans on Saturday evening?” Jensen returned with a small smile. They didn't have much time, since the train was already waiting.

“None so far.”

“Then how about dinner? Steak or something?”

Tom grinned widely. “I'd love to. I'll make the reservations this time.”

“Alright.”

“I'll pick you up at seven?”

Jensen confirmed with a nod, then reached up to pull Tom down for a kiss goodbye. “I'll text you my address,” he said before hopping onto the train.

“Looking forward to it,” Tom had that permanent Cheshire-cat grin going on, which was ten kinds of adorable.

Jensen smiled back fondly. “Me too.”

Yeah, he could get used to this. He could settle for this.

If there wasn't the little voice in the back of his brain, nagging at him to think about what an insensitive asshole he was.

He shut it off.

Because obviously and despite some earlier signs, it didn't look like Misha was interested in him. And if that was the case, Jensen shouldn't have to feel bad for looking elsewhere and putting his feelers out.

It was all just to get over his stupid crush on Misha, anyway.

***

Misha actually glared after Jensen asked him to babysit on Saturday.

“So you really like this guy, huh?” he asked without facing Jensen.

“I do,” Jensen admitted. And damn, he didn't want to feel guilty about it, but he did. Especially because of the undertone in Misha's voice.

“Third date?”

“Yeah.”

“Just remember to hang a sock on the bedroom door,” Misha mumbled.

Jensen huffed and rolled his eyes. “Just because it's our third date doesn't mean that anything's gonna happen.”

Misha shrugged as if he didn't even care, which had Jensen counting to ten slowly to not lose his shit.

If Misha had such an obvious problem with Jensen dating Tom, he should be man enough to go ahead and say it.

The point was, a part of Jensen didn't want to hear if Misha had a problem with it or not.

If he didn't have – or had, just because of the wrong reasons – a problem with Jensen dating then Jensen's illusion and hope would be shattered once and for all.

And if he had, because of all the right reasons, then that would be the end of their friendship and the potential start of something new and... Jensen wasn't proud of it, but that idea scared him, too.

***

On Saturday night, Jensen was running late.

Misha had to pull a late one at the News, and even though Jensen had planned to be in the shower half an hour ago, AJ didn't agree with that. And so Jensen watched the minutes tick by on the clock on the kitchen wall as AJ cried and cried in his arms.

“I know you're getting two teeth at once, little one, but daddy really needs to get going,” Jensen mumbled soothingly as he rocked AJ in his arms. “C'mon, it's okay. I'm here.”

It wasn't okay, not for AJ, not until Misha came over ten minutes later and plucked him from Jensen's arms.

“It's okay, you just go and shower,” he said, then shifted his attention to AJ.

Jensen hopped under the spray, and by the time he was finished and toweled off, the crying had stopped.

However, he froze with the towel in his hand when the doorbell rang. Well, shit.

“Misha, could you get that?” Jensen yelled through the closed bathroom door. “I'm kind of... indecent at the moment.”

“Yeah, yeah!” Misha called back, then Jensen heard the buzzer and not too long after, the apartment door opening and falling shut.

He had to tell himself that there wasn't time to eavesdrop, no matter how much he wanted to. Instead, Jensen pulled on his favorite pair of dark jeans and a simple white button-down, hurriedly blow-dried his hair and styled it with quick, practiced moves.

When he exited the bathroom, Jensen found Misha and Tom standing in the hallway, both looking uncomfortable and shifting from one foot onto the other.

“Hey, Tom,” Jensen smiled and ignored the weird atmosphere altogether. He'd grill Misha later about what had happened, if Tom wouldn't tell him anyway. “Sorry for the delay, AJ wouldn't let me shower.”

“Don't worry. I only made reservations for half past 7, and we don't have far to go,” Tom answered, and pulled Jensen into a hug as soon as he had stepped up to him.

Jensen kissed him soundly on the lips to say hello properly, feeling like a rebellious teenager at seeing Misha swallow heavily from the corner of his eyes.

“Awesome,” he grinned instead, then leaned back to look at Misha, who seemed irritated at best and like he was angry under a well-maintained surface. “Everything alright with AJ?”

“Yeah, yeah. He's sleeping now. Probably just his teeth or his constipation again.”

Tom didn't bat an eyelash at the comment, which Jensen noted duly.

“I'll just say goodbye to him, then we can go,” Jensen said towards Tom. He ducked into the nursery, where AJ slept peacefully, to press a quick kiss to AJ's forehead.

There wasn't one word said between Tom and Misha until Jensen returned. Which was when Misha cleared his throat and obviously forced himself to say, “You two have fun tonight, alright?”

“We will,” Tom answered with a smile before his eyes drifted from Misha over to Jensen, then back, then to Jensen again.

Jensen's feelings were, admittedly, more than just on the fence. Because here he was with a beautiful, nice guy who obviously liked him and took him out on a date, and he should be happy. Instead, he kind-of wanted to stay at home, curl up on the couch with the man who stood behind him, arms hanging at his side, anger and sadness shining in his eyes that he didn't want anyone to see. Jensen, however, knew him better than that. Jensen also knew that even though he kind-of wanted to stay at home, it kind-of wouldn't get him anywhere except deeper into the bottomless pit of feelings that Misha had dug into his heart.

So he smiled back and nodded to confirm Tom's words before they headed out the door.

They got as far as the entrance door, where Tom pulled Jensen aside, pushed him softly back towards the wall. “I'm sorry, but I... there's something I really need to do right now,” Tom said, eyes pleading as he leaned in with a deep sigh.

“Sure, what--” Jensen began, but got cut off by Tom's lips covering his own, stealing the words right out of his mouth and leaving him speechless.

Tom kissed him, long and deep and passionate, with quick nibbles against his lower lip and tentative strokes of his tongue across Jensen's teeth. Jensen's heart jumped immediately to a higher pace as his back hit the wall and his hands curled around Tom's waist reflexively. He was barely able to catch a breath between kisses, and when Tom finally leaned back, they both gasped for air.

“What was that about?” Jensen chuckled amused, his forehead resting against Tom's as he bumped their noses questioningly.

“Nothing, just... he... I mean, your babysitter. What's his name?”

“Misha,” Jensen answered, confused that this would come up now that Tom's kiss had made him forget about his best friend and crush of half a year momentarily.

“Yeah, um... Misha said that I better not hurt you, or else... and I guess I just needed to prove that to you, you know. Because I wouldn't,” Tom explained hurriedly, his bangs falling into his eyes.

Jensen reached up to brush them back into his neatly styled hair and smiled. “I know that, Tom.”

“I also have the feeling he doesn't like me very much,” Tom added off-handedly with a shrug.

“Don't worry, he'll come around. I think he's just a bit hesitant and he thinks he has to play the intimidating best friend.”

Tom bit his bottom lip, a move that fascinated Jensen so much that he almost overheard Tom's next words. “Are you sure that there isn't more?”

“Yeah, I'm sure,” Jensen said as firmly as he could manage, and held in the sigh that threatened to escape his lips.

“Good,” Tom nodded. Then he leaned down and captured Jensen's lips in a soft, calm kiss that was more playful than the passionate one from before.

Jensen sighed and melted into it, because damn, it felt good to be wanted, and Tom surely did his best to make him feel that way.

Despite the rocky start, it turned out to be a very enjoyable date after all.

***

Jensen should've known.

He really should've known that all of this was going far too well, that something would disrupt his perfectly evolving world eventually.

Said world broke down with a phone call he got the following week, half an hour before his lunch break, as he walked out of a conference and turned his phone back on.

“Jay, finally,” Misha almost yelled, obviously in panic and breathless, and Jensen's brain instantly kicked into overdrive.

“What? What is it?”

“I'm... I'm at the hospital. Medical City Children's Hospital. Just come.”

“Misha, what the-- tell me what the fuck is going on?” Jensen felt his nerves slip. Children's hospital. No, please no, don't let it be--

“It's AJ. Just come, please, I need you here.”


	7. Chapter 7

Jensen had a disturbing kind of déjà vu on his way to the hospital.

Except that this time, it was a different hospital, and there wasn't ice glimmering on the surface of the street as his car ate up the miles. Instead, the sun was standing high in the sky, burning the earth with unrelenting heat. The part that was familiar was the gut-wrenching panic in Jensen's stomach that made him want to vomit all over the dashboard, even though he didn't have time for this. He needed to get to his kid in one piece, because God knew AJ had enough dead parents already.

Jensen's hands were sweaty and shaking when he pulled up to the hospital parking lot, set the car into park and sprinted into the building, barely remembering that he needed to lock it, too.

He found Misha pacing in the waiting room on the third floor, like he had told Jensen on the phone.

“Mish!” Jensen called out, ignoring the nurses left and right as he ran towards him, grabbing him by his upper arms.

“Jay, thank God,” Misha sighed in relief and slumped forward into Jensen's touch. He was clearly exhausted, his eyes red-rimmed and his face as white as a sheet.

“What happened?”

“I tried to reach you, but-- AJ cried so much and his belly felt hardened and I was... I was so afraid that he had a bowel occlusion, so I took him here. With all the constipation he had lately I thought...” Misha broke off to bury his face in both hands, shaking his head. “I'm so sorry, I hope it's nothing.”

“Did the doctors say anything?” Jensen chased impatiently.

“They wouldn't tell me, since I'm not his guardian,” Misha shook his head again, then shrugged and slapped his hands frustrated against his thighs.

“Sir, excuse me?” a female voice interrupted them, and when Jensen turned around, he found a brown-haired nurse watching him, a clipboard in her hand. “Are you Andrew Ackles' guardian?”

“Yes, I am,” Jensen confirmed, already digging into his pocket for his wallet.

After checking his ID, the nurse nodded and said, “Please follow me, Dr. Meyer is already waiting for you.”

The lump in his throat prevented Jensen from saying anything to Misha, but the other man just waved him off. “Go, I'll see you afterwards.”

Jensen simply clapped his hand onto Misha's shoulder, a quiet thanks for his support, and headed down the hallway, following the nurse.

The doctor that awaited Jensen in an office three doors down was a middle-aged man with salt and pepper hair. He was smiling, which made Jensen preemptively hopeful. AJ was resting in a crib beside his examining table, very fussy and very alive, so Jensen took a deep breath before asking, “Can I--?” and reaching for the boy.

“Sure,” the doctor answered with a nod.

Jensen picked up AJ and pressed him close to his chest, a wave of overwhelming happiness and gratefulness washing over him as he closed his eyes and just focused on AJ's chest rising and falling against his. “He's alright?”

“He's alright, yes,” the doctor confirmed. “Your uh... partner? He brought him in because he suspected an ileus. Lucky for the little man, he was wrong. We ran several tests, but all he needs is some meds to ease the constipation.”

“Thank God,” Jensen breathed out. AJ squirmed against him, clearly upset by the hectic and unknown environment, tears shining in his eyes. “Hey, hey,” Jensen soothed him, stroking his hand over his head, and watched helplessly as AJ's bottom lip began to tremble. “Hey, it's alright, daddy's here. You're okay.”

AJ started sobbing little hiccups into Jensen's shirt, and the doctor smiled gently. “He's just out of his depth. Babies his age are usually very suspicious towards strangers. He did very well here despite that, but I think you two better head home. Don't forget to leave your insurance information at the nurse's desk.”

“Will do. Thank you, Doctor...”

“Meyer.”

“Thank you, Dr. Meyer,” Jensen said gratefully, then shook the other man's hand.

When he went back out and picked Misha up from the waiting room, the other man shot him an anxious look. “Is he-”

Jensen interrupted him immediately. “Yeah, he's fine. Just constipation. Can you hold him for a second, I need to talk to the nurse about the insurance.”

“Of course.”

***

On their way home, as the tension and the anxiety of the last hour slowly fell away from Jensen, he found that it was replaced with something else, something he hadn't counted on.

Rage.

Not just anger or frustration, but outright rage.

Misha should've know. He could've called Jared first, at least that's what Jensen would've done. No, instead he sent both Jensen and AJ into a panic – the baby was still crying on the back seat, still upset because of all the things happening around him.

Jensen didn't know how to address it.

While he knew that part of that rage was just an overreaction to the overwhelming fear and the déjà vu and the helplessness he felt on his way to the hospital, he also knew that he had a right to be upset.

It all broke out once AJ was calm enough so they could put him to sleep in his crib, and Jensen headed back to the living room, where he found Misha pacing and fumbling with a piece of paper in his hands.

Jensen realized it was the piece of paper where he had written down all of AJ's emergency contacts for Mackenzie all those months ago.

“So you packed up my kid and just drove him to the hospital?” Jensen burst out, unable to tone it down.

Misha immediately straightened his posture and went into a defensive stance. “Yes, I did. So?”

Jensen threw his hands up helplessly. “Jesus fucking Christ, why didn't you--”

“What, call you? Have you looked at your phone, Jensen? At the twenty missed calls? Oh, and for the record, I also tried to call Dr. Padalecki, but he wasn't available either, so what should I have done, huh? Try again in five minutes, when it could've already been too late?”

“Yeah, well - it wasn't!” Jensen yelled, losing his remaining patience. “Do you know how much I freaked out? Did you see AJ in the hospital, how scared and spooked he was?”

“At least he's alive!”

“He would've been anyway!”

“Which I couldn't have known! You know what, I won't apologize for this, Jensen. I'm not sorry. Sure, it might've been an overreaction, but think about... what if it hadn't been. I was afraid to be right about this, you know, so I'm glad I wasn't, but this could've ended a lot worse, and I didn't want you to go through this.”

Jensen huffed and crossed his arms defensively over his chest. “Oh, good for you,” he snarked back.

“Okay, can you please just stop being fucking pissed at me? I did what I thought was right. I understand if you don't see my reasons for this-”

Jensen felt how a fresh wave of rage took him away. “Well, you're not his father, so you can't just decide this!”

“Newsflash, Jensen, neither are you!” Misha shouted back, obviously angry now, too.

Jensen was so speechless that he only gaped at Misha for a moment. “But I'm the one who's taking care of him!”

“And so am I, so excuse me for feeling kind of responsible!” Misha stepped towards him, his lips pressed to a thin line as he got into Jensen's face.

Jensen lashed out and he knew it, but damn Misha for being so infuriating. He laughed cruelly. “Okay, who says you've got any role in AJ's life, and who gave you the right to-” 

“That's not my point! I wouldn't want you to have to go through this because I know what it's-”

“What are you even talking about?” Jensen yelled again, then took a deep breath. He needed to calm down. He seriously needed to calm down or he'd say something he'd seriously regret later.

“Can I please just explain without you interrupting me every few seconds?” Misha blurted out.

For a couple moments they stared each other down, eyes fixed and stern and not budging an inch, chests heaving with labored breath and deep anger.

That was when the baby monitor flared up, AJ's soft crying throwing them out of their stupor. Great, now they even managed to wake him up, Jensen thought and sighed.

“I'll go get him,” Jensen grumbled as he sidestepped Misha and strode towards the nursery with long steps.

When he returned with AJ in his arms, Misha sat on the couch with his eyes closed. Wordlessly, Jensen sat down at a reasonable distance beside him, rocking AJ softly.

“Please explain, then,” Jensen said softly and still unnerved without looking at Misha.

After another few minutes of silence, Misha sighed and opened his eyes. “I had a wife and a daughter, not too long ago,” he began, leaning forward to rest his elbows on his knees and his chin in his hands. “We had been together since high school, and I was sure she was the one for me. So we got married and not two years after, had our first child. We were so happy back then, we thought there would be nothing that would ever break us apart.”

Misha huffed bitterly and glanced at Jensen, who only noticed from the corner of his eye. He was too busy avoiding Misha's look and instead focused on AJ, who balled his fists into Jensen's shirt.

“So what happened?” Jensen asked, genuinely curious.

“We traveled to Africa to help with a UNICEF project. Building schools and orphanages, things like that. Didn't matter that we had our little daughter with us, I mean, children grow up in Africa, too, right? So we got her vaccinated against everything we could think of, and thought we'd be safe, since we always wanted to do something like this. Well, mostly me. We weren't even staying too far out; there was a small town with a doctor and a hospital just an hour away.”

Misha's voice had trailed off, got smaller and quieter with every sentence, and Jensen finally looked over to find him with a distinctive wetness in his blue eyes. He knew the punch would come any second now.

“She suffered from constipation from the different food over there, and it happened a few times until it got worse one day. We thought we'd treat her like we did every time. Little did we know that it wasn't constipation, but a bowel occlusion, which has similar symptoms but can end a lot worse. Our little girl died that night in Africa, because we didn't drive the one hour to the doctor. She didn't even get to be a year old. And all because I wanted to go over there and help with a charity project so badly.”

“I'm sorry,” Jensen whispered and instinctively held AJ a little tighter against his chest. The boy only gave a quick, surprised squeal before he buried his head against Jensen's neck.

“It's-” Misha started, but broke off to take a shaky breath. “No, actually, it's not okay. But, so you understand what happened this morning. It freaked me out more than anything, to see AJ with the same symptoms, and all these old memories came back up and-- I didn't know what else to do.”

Jensen felt how his throat clogged up with unshed tears at the thought of losing AJ like this, the anger long dissolved. “No, I... I understand,” he managed.

“Thank you,” Misha nodded, his head bowed to his chest, and Jensen noticed a stray drop rolling down his cheek. “I didn't just lose my daughter over this, you know. I lost everything. My wife and I broke up over the fights that followed soon after that, over guilt trips and accusations and me taking the blame for something no one could be blamed for, really. Eventually we returned to the US to get divorced. We sold our house, our home, and all the baby stuff that we still had. Then I moved here for a fresh start.”

Jensen didn't find any words to say to that, so he just cradled AJ with one arm and pulled Misha into a one-armed hug with the other. Following AJ's example, Misha rested his head in the crook of Jensen's neck, let himself be held and let his tears drop into Jensen's good work shirt. Jensen couldn't care less, though.

They sat like that for a while, Jensen wedged uncomfortably between the back rest of the sofa, Misha's grip firm on his hip, and AJ – Jesus, that boy had gained a few pounds in those last months – on his other side.

When Misha finally lifted his head, his eyes were red-rimmed and blot-shot, his cheeks puffy. Jensen noticed he had a sore spot on his lower lip. “Oh God, I'm so sorry,” Misha sighed.

“No,” Jensen simply answered with a firm shake of his head. “Don't be.”

They were still sitting too close, Misha within kissing distance, looking so lost. Jensen's newfound caretaker urges reached a new height, but AJ was the one who broke the moment.

Tiny fingers reached out, and with an excited yelp, AJ had a fistful of Misha's dark curls in his hand.

“Hey,” Misha chuckled amused, while Jensen scolded, “AJ!” and pried the boy's fingers off of Misha's head. AJ wasn't particularly stoked by the change of plans, but quickly returned the smile of the two adults watching him. Then he giggled a short laugh and with his eyes focused on Misha, slammed his palms down on the other man's chest.

Jensen didn't stand a chance of holding him any longer, so he handed him over.

“You don't wanna be with papa?” Misha asked him softly.

And well, Jensen couldn't stay mad at him, even less so when his foster son decided to wrap both his little arms around Misha's neck and cuddle close. Misha just made a soft “Oof”-noise, because the little one was developing some strength these days as well.

Their eyes met over AJ's head and they exchanged a heartfelt smile.

“I have to apologize,” Jensen stated eventually. “I'm sorry for lashing out the way I did earlier.”

“It's okay. It's not like you could've known.”

“And thanks for telling me all this.”

Misha nodded, then looked down at AJ before placing a soft kiss on his forehead. “Sorry for spooking you, little one. I'm so glad you're okay, you don't even know,” he whispered.

Jensen had the acute fear that his heart would melt in his chest at the picture, now that he understood what it meant to Misha to have a second chance with AJ.

***

The days got quieter after that, and even though a bit of the thickness in the air had cleared after their shouting match, a few things remained unfixed.

Because there was no reason not to, Jensen still went on dates with Tom. It was mostly lunch dates on Mondays and Thursdays, when Jensen was at work, and dinner dates on Saturday.

Misha's behavior towards Tom only changed after another two weeks, and only after Jensen called him out on it.

“Jeez, why don't you try to stab him instead of just looking at him like you'd want to?” he hissed when Tom was on his way up the stairs, on his way to pick Jensen up for dinner and a movie.

Misha already glared through the door, his frown deepening while Tom's steps got louder. “Sorry,” he mumbled. “I better head to the living room. Have fun.”

Jensen raised his eyebrow and shook his head as he turned to open the door. “Don't try to blow me away with your enthusiasm,” he mumbled to himself, but then Tom was there, with a wide smile and inviting arms that enveloped Jensen immediately.

He tried to forget about Misha and his qualms about Tom, although he didn't quite manage to.

Dates with Tom were fun. He had that easy, boyish charm going for him and they both just clicked in a way that made Jensen feel welcome in this relationship. Wanted, desired, interesting. When Tom looked into his eyes and leaned down to kiss him, he felt good. Not like the world was spinning out of its orbit or turning upside down, but good.

The fact that Tom was hot didn't hurt either. To be exact, he was seriously, scorching hot, and sometimes when he would look at Jensen through his lashes and smirk that damn lopsided smirk at him, Jensen could almost feel his knees turn to jello.

Which was confusing, because when Jensen found the time to get himself off, it still wasn't Tom's set of blue eyes he imagined staring at him while full, plush lips sucked down his cock and he buried his hand in adorably disheveled, dark curls of hair.

Jensen was so not over Misha that it was almost painful. And there was nothing Tom could do about it.

Not when Misha was the first person Jensen saw every morning, drenched in sweat and sometimes rain, who brought him coffee and comforted his little kid when he was cranky, and who spent most of his evenings – except Saturday – with him and a glass of wine on the couch. Not when Jensen knew that he wouldn't want it any other way, except for maybe waking up directly next to Misha. Not when Misha still only needed to throw him a look that was a tidbit longer than normal and Jensen's hopes would flare up completely anew. 

Not when he knew he loved Misha, regardless of his quirks and flaws.

Which was admittedly the scariest thought he'd had in a while, and the epiphany left him sitting straight in his bed at 3.30 a.m., staring at the wall and wondering what he should do with his life.

Pursuing the relationship with the guy he knew he could settle for because they mutually liked each other, or stay hopelessly in love with the straight guy he knew he couldn't have.

Talk about a rock and a hard place.

***

“Misha's birthday is in a week,” Jensen sighed into the speaker of his phone. “And I have no idea what to get him.”

“How about a vibrator? Or a fleshlight, dunno which kind of guy he is. Since it doesn't look like you'll make that move on him anytime soon,” Mackenzie suggested.

“Oh, fuck you too, shortstack,” Jensen grumbled.

“Hey, I was being serious!”

“Sure.”

Jensen rolled his eyes and shifted the phone to cradle it between his left shoulder and his head as he prepared some banana pulp for AJ.

“And let's forget that I'm dating Tom, huh?” Jensen added on a sidenote.

Mackenzie chuckled. “Yeah, and how's that going for you?”

“We're good. He's amazing.”

“Has he met AJ yet?”

Jensen cleared his throat, then carried the bowl of pulp to the table, where AJ was already playing around with his plastic children's spoon and watching him anticipated. “No, he hasn't.”

“And why is that?”

“I dunno, we just... never came around to do that.”

“It's completely not because, say, you don't want AJ to meet Tom just yet, because for you, Misha is the only one you want to raise him with? Because settling with Tom would only ever be your second choice?” Mackenzie asked.

“Maybe.”

“Jensen, come on,” she chased. “If you're not honest with Tom or Misha, at least be honest with me.”

Jensen put down the spoon he was feeding AJ with and ignored the boy using his own to spread the pulp in a two feet radius around his chair. “Honestly? I recently realized that I love Misha. Like, not just being stupidly and irrationally in love with him, but I love him, okay? Love the way he has his socks on backwards sometimes and the way he drools on my shoulder when he falls asleep on the couch with me and love the way he plays with AJ and... I am so royally fucked, you have no idea,” Jensen groaned.

“Language, big bro,” Mackenzie chided him. “And wow. That was actually kind of sweet.”

“Yeah, well, I've got no idea how I should tell him this. He had a wife, you know. Told me recently,” Jensen stirred the pulp, lost in thought, before offering AJ another spoonful.

“Ouch.”

“Tell me about it.”

“So he's straight?”

“I guess. He hasn't said anything to correct it so far.”

“I'm sorry, Jensen.”

“Not like it's your fault that you got a dumbass with a broken gaydar for a brother,” Jensen sighed.

“I honestly don't know what to tell you,” Mackenzie echoed the sigh. “Wait for Misha? Stay with Tom?”

“Well, seeing as things are now, I'm acting like a total asshole towards both of them. Tom is way too nice to deserve someone using him to make someone else jealous. And Misha may be a coward – that is, if there really are feelings or anything here – but he doesn't deserve to be played like that, either,” Jensen mused.

“I'm glad you see what you're doing. And whatever you decide in the end, just make sure you don't hurt yourself too much in the process.”

“That's easier said than done.”

“I know.”

***

“Hey! Didn't expect you here just yet,” Jensen grinned when he recognized Tom standing in the door.

“Yeah, I thought I'd stop by early,” Tom answered. “May I come in?”

“Of course, but be warned that I still have to get ready,” Jensen smiled as he closed the door behind Tom. “Make yourself comfortable.”

His eyes were drawn to Tom's broad back as he bent to unlace and kick off his shoes. Jensen still wore a pair of shorts and an old t-shirt, but he had planned to go shower for his date night with Tom just five minutes ago.

“Like what you see?” Tom teased, now standing straight in front of Jensen.

“Obviously,” Jensen quirked an eyebrow.

“Hey, uh... where's AJ?”

“With Misha, they're on a walk and won't be back for another hour. He'd thought he'd give me some time before our date.”

“How considerate,” Tom chuckled, smirking lopsided.

Jensen couldn't shake the feeling that Tom seemed strangely wistful today, but tried to hide it. That train of thought got derailed quickly when Tom backed him up against the wall beside the door. His lips pressed against Jensen's with unexpected vigor, his tongue ravishing Jensen's mouth until his cock was painfully hard where it was pressed against Tom's thigh. Tom's own arousal didn't go by unnoticed, but Jensen was too busy gasping for air against the sweet seduction of Tom's lips, and let himself get swept away by the warm feeling curling in his stomach.

When Tom tilted his hips just so, their dicks rubbed against each other's, only thin fabric separating them, and a mutual moan escaped both their lips. Tom's hands were firmly clasped around Jensen's hips, keeping him against the wall, and Jensen had always had a thing for guys who could do that. Being toppy bastards, that is.

“Wanna move this elsewhere? We've still got time,” Jensen offered after biting down lightly on Tom's bottom lip, which elicited another delighted moan.

“Not right now, no,” Tom laughed breathlessly, his lips hovering mere inches away from Jensen's, the light brush of them tickling along his sensitive skin like an electric current. “I'd really like to go on that date with you, you know, so you better get dressed.”

Suddenly, Jensen was released from Tom's hands, and all he could do was let his head drop against the hard wall behind him.

“I hate you,” he threw at Tom, but betrayed his words with the following grin.

“I know you do. And since it's opposite day, I always wanted to tell you that your ass isn't all that great.”

“Fuck you, too, Welling,” Jensen shoved Tom to the side to get to the bathroom.

Tom cackled. “In your dreams, Ackles.”

When Jensen walked away, he had a strange thought nagging at the back of his mind.

 _Point proven_ , it said.

Because Tom might be hot as hell and a damn good kisser, but Jensen still jerked off to pictures of Misha in his head. Plus, he didn't see Tom making out with him there, even though he knew it was Tom, no matter how much his mind wanted him to believe it was Misha.

***

“Happy birthday, Misha!”

Misha blinked sleepily at him, hair disheveled and still wearing an old t-shirt with sleeping creases in it. “And there I thought I could actually sleep in on my birthday,” he grumbled, but accepted the hug Jensen swept him up in, even lifting him off the floor. “No cake?”

“Nah, I've got something better,” Jensen explained when he had sat Misha back down onto his feet and pulled back reluctantly. Really, he'd take any chance he could get to touch Misha, and this... this was indulging himself.

“Yeah?”

“Yeah. You know how I promised to take you sightseeing and you never took me up on it? Well, we're doing that today. You, me, AJ, the whole day, the grand tour of Dallas, Texas.”

 _Like a date_ , Jensen wanted to say, but didn't. He just quirked an eyebrow at Misha, the implication clear in his words.

Misha nodded. “Am I allowed to get dressed first?”

“By any means, please don't feel obligated,” Jensen shook his head, then grinned.

“Bet you'd like that,” Misha teased. “Going on a nudist date.”

Lucky for him, he turned around and missed the way Jensen's face crumbled into something between confusion, happiness and so, so much hope. God, he shouldn't. At this point he really shouldn't get his hopes up any more. For Christ's sake, he was dating Tom. Had been dating Tom for over a month now.

And yet, when Misha called it a date, Jensen's heart almost jumped out of his chest. That stupid, treacherous thing.

***

With AJ strapped to Jensen's back, they made the best of their day – and since Zero Gravity wasn't really an option with an infant and Jensen knew that Misha was more into art anyway, they spent the day walking the halls of various art museums plus the sculpture park, the Klyde Warren Park and the Aquarium. Especially the latter had AJ squirming around in his carrier, eager to look at the fish swimming around on the other side of the glass.

Misha eventually had pity with the little one and picked him up, which reminded Jensen of how much his back already ached.

“Hey, we can switch if you want,” Misha offered with a nod at the supply bag at his side. It only held fresh diapers and a thermos with hot water for AJ's formula, which was lighter than AJ himself was at this point.

“If you really don't mind?” Jensen asked.

“Not at all.”

And despite a few skeptical glances from the people passing by, Jensen let Misha strap on the carrier and set AJ so that he was leaning against Misha's chest, looking forward. During the whole ordeal, he realized why everyone was staring the way they did. He had gotten so used to it, but this was different than being stared at for pushing a pink stroller through the park with a man walking at his side.

With Misha carrying AJ, it looked a whole lot like they were two fathers with a kid, and that wasn't something the people saw too often. Or dealt with so openly, at the very least.

Still, seeing AJ grab for Misha's hand before twisting his head back to look at him was ten kinds of cute.

Misha caught him staring and grinned back.

***

“Awesome day, thank you so much,” Misha said as he flopped down beside Jensen on the sofa. “Guess AJ will be sleeping like a rock tonight.”

AJ had been exhausted from all the new impressions that he had been exposed to throughout the day. He had been up almost constantly – except for the quick nap throughout the sculpture park – and his eyes had fallen shut the second his head hit the mattress of his crib.

“Yeah,” Jensen answered with a heartfelt smile, then handed the second bottle of beer he brought with him to Misha. “And it was my pleasure.” Their hands brushed, and Jensen felt his skin tingle where it met Misha's, something so familiar and common these days that he shouldn't even notice any more.

That he still did should tell him a thing or two, Jensen stated to himself as his eyes met Misha's deep blue ones. Eyes that still took his breath away for a fragment of a second every time he looked into them.

With a silent nod, they clinked their bottles and shared a grin.

However, Jensen forgot his attempt to ask what they would be doing for the rest of the evening as soon as he saw the grimace on Misha's face after his sip. He waited a few dreadful moments before Misha took a deep breath and began to speak.

“Listen, Jensen, I've been meaning to tell you, but I... uh, I didn't want to ruin our day,” Misha mumbled while picking at the label of his beer.

“What is it?” Jensen swallowed heavily.

“You know I've been freelancing at the Morning News for months now, and I always hoped that would get me a full time job there sooner or later,” Misha sighed. “They offered me one yesterday.”

“Well, that's great! So what's the matter?” Jensen smiled, waited some more for the other shoe to drop. If Misha wasn't so happy about the job offer, there had to be a catch to it.

“They offered me the position of their foreign correspondent, since I'm fluent in Russian. The job would be in Moscow.”

Moscow.

As in, Russia.

“Seriously?” Jensen gaped at him, unable to form a coherent sentence right now.

“That's what I said, too, but yes – seriously. I mean, it's a great opportunity and all, but it's...”

“It's Russia.”

“Yeah.”

“We'd be living in different timezones,” Jensen huffed, surprised at the fact that this was his first thought.

“Ten hours apart.”

Jensen stared at him wordlessly. The sadness, the building emptiness in his chest made him feel melancholic, which he thought he'd overcome not too long ago.

“So when are you going to leave?” Jensen asked, trying to cover up how shaken he was by the news and probably failing.

“Oh, don't get me wrong. I haven't signed yet. They just told me about the job, that it would be available from around the end of December and that I should think about it, since the move would be a lot to arrange and deal with and all.”

The load that was taken off Jensen's mind wasn't as big as he thought it would be at that statement. “AJ would miss you terribly,” he mumbled quietly.

Misha just nodded and stared guiltily onto the floor.

 _To hell with it,_ Jensen thought. He couldn't expect honesty from Misha if he wasn't willing to admit some things out loud, too.

“I'd miss you terribly, for that matter. I really don't know what I'd do without you.”

Misha's Adam's apple bopped up and down as he swallowed, and if Jensen wasn't mistaken, then there were tiny droplets forming in the corners of his eyes. Then Misha looked away quickly and cleared his throat.

“You're gonna be fine. You've got Tom, after all.”

“Yeah, but...” Jensen took a deep breath. “But Tom's not you.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> One more extra long chapter plus an epilogue, which will be up some time in the next two weeks, and this story will officially be finished... I'm kinda sad, although I know you're going to love the next chapter. :)


	8. Chapter 8

“So, what's going on on the daddy front?” Jared asked while he completed AJ's routine exam.

Jensen sighed. “Too much. Feeling like I'm in high school again. Or stuck in a damn soap opera.”

“Why is that?”

“Listen, I'd hate to dump this on you-”

“Jensen, we've been here before. You know you can tell me, even if it's not connected to me being AJ's pediatrician,” Jared reminded him with a risen eyebrow and scaled AJ.

Jensen pursed his lips, but then scrubbed his hand over his eyes. “Alright. In a nutshell... My neighbor slash babysitter slash best friend, whom I've been in love with for the past eight months, has a job offer to go to Russia as the Morning News' foreign correspondent, and the guy I'm dating is so sweet and understanding that I'd hate to break his heart by telling him the truth.”

Jared actually had the nerve to chuckle. “The classic love-triangle, huh? Sounds like Days of our Lives after all.”

With a snort, Jensen turned to AJ, picking him up to put him in his carrier. “I guess you could call it that.”

“Well, I might not get paid for advice in love affairs – and my wife keeps telling me to stick to the stuff I'm actually good at – but, um... Jensen, you have to be honest with yourself. And once you figure out what you really want, you need to be honest with those two, too. Even if it means that you break someone's heart and lose someone else because he doesn't return your feelings. But that's the risk of falling in love, and if you're not willing to take that risk, you'll be stuck in this unsatisfying limbo indefinitely.”

Jensen swallowed heavily around the lump in his throat. “Yeah, well. Maybe I just need to get over this stupid crush. He's had all the time and the hints in the world, and yet he hasn't made a move on me. So why would he make it now?”

“Don't you think your signs have been a bit mixed, too?” Jared threw him a challenging look over his shoulder while he took down his notes on AJ. “You meet him every day, you two are practically living together and raising a kid together like a couple, and then you go out and start dating someone else?”

“I just wanted him to see that I was ready for a relationship again,” Jensen explained. “And maybe to make him jealous, to be honest.”

“Has Tom met AJ yet?”

“No.”

“And how has Misha been reacting to Tom?”

“Grumpy to hostile, depending on the day,” Jensen huffed. “Although Tom hasn't given him any reason to.”

“Trust me, he didn't need to. All he needed was to be the one who dated you.”

“So you're implying--”

Jared nodded, a tiny smirk tugging at the edge of his lips. “From what it sounds like, you sure as hell made him jealous.”

“If it bothered him so much, why didn't he tell me?”

“And what, break up the happy couple?”

Jensen bit down on his bottom lip and turned away, realization dawning on him.

“Talk to Tom, Jensen. Maybe you'll be surprised what he has to say. And get your head out of your butt.”

“Butt?” Jensen asked, surprised.

“I don't swear in front of my young patients. It's called being professional.”

***

“Hey,” Tom greeted him a few days later, when they met up for lunch on Monday. His smile was as wide and toothy as always, and Jensen really liked that smile.

He already hated himself for having to wipe it off Tom's face.

But he had to do this now.

“Hey, Tom.”

He didn't kiss Tom hello before he sat down at the table, which was duly noted by the man in question.

“What's up?” he frowned.

“I think we... I think we need to talk,” Jensen stuttered and felt completely and utterly like shit.

“Is something wrong?”

“No. Yes. Kinda. It's not your fault, and I'm so sorry that I have to do this to you, I know this is a major dick move and... have you ordered yet? Because you might want to re-think having lunch with me,” Jensen rambled, his hands flying through the air in front of him on their own accord.

“Jensen,” Tom shook his head, still frowning as he reached across the table and grabbed Jensen's hands. “What's the matter? Start at the beginning.”

“I'm--” Jensen broke off, let his head drop back to take a deep, steadying breath. “I think we should stop dating. I haven't been completely honest with you.”

The frown on Tom's face turned from confused to sad, and Jensen felt his heart ache for the other man. Instead of throwing a fit, though, Tom squeezed his hands tighter.

“What is it that you haven't been honest about?”

“That I started dating you despite knowing that I'm not exactly... available. Don't get me wrong, I'm not married or something, but there's someone I've had feelings for a while now and I like you a lot – I do – but that someone seems to have a too strong a hold on me.”

“And you think I didn't know that?” Tom sighed wistfully. “You think I didn't feel that, too? Last Saturday, when I picked you up earlier than you expected? That... that was me taking a chance and seeing if there could be more between us. And it didn't feel quite right. I already guessed that there was someone else, since it's been pretty obvious.”

“Is it?” Jensen sighed. “Look, I'm so sorry for this. For being so selfish and... I dunno, maybe it was too much too soon.”

“It's far from okay, Jensen, but let's face it,” Tom began with a bitter, but somehow amused tone that surprised Jensen, “these lunches haven't been a date since, what, the third time we were out?”

_Because you met Misha then,_ Jensen thought, but didn't answer. He just shrugged, daring Tom to go on.

“Which would be the reason why we never got any further than this. I bet I could even tell you exactly why that is,” Tom smiled sadly.

Jensen sighed. “Go right ahead.”

Tom raised a cocky eyebrow. “Because when I picked you up for our third date, I met Misha.”

With a huff, Jensen couldn't help but smile, too. In a parallel universe, they could've gotten along as more than friends easily. They thought very alike, shared the same sense of humor and the same nature. It was why Tom let Jensen down easy and with a bitter-sweet smile, even if he was clearly into him.

“And Misha's just my friend and my babysitter,” Jensen said instead of all that.

Tom stared at him for a long minute before shaking his head slowly. “I'm just your friend, and I'd love to be your babysitter once you find the balls to ask the _right_ guy out.”

“I'm-”

“Jensen,” Tom fixed him with a firm look. “This is a peace offering. Don't think I do this lightheartedly, because I don't. I really hoped we would go somewhere, because I do like you a lot, too. But the fact remains that I haven't even gotten to know AJ in almost two months. That your heart clearly isn't into this speaks for itself. I know when to cut my losses, no matter how much I don't want to.”

Jensen was shocked into silence, before a heavy weight lifted off his shoulders all at once. “You're-- I don't-- I mean thank you, I'm-” Jensen shook his head, still too surprised by the turn of events. “I don't deserve this. I've been such a dick.”

Tom interrupted his incoherent rambling. “Just answer me one question?”

“Sure, what is it?” Jensen shifted uncomfortably on his chair, preparing for the worst.

“Why have you never made a move on him?” Tom asked.

Jensen swallowed heavily. Yeah, why hadn't he? “Because I'm a coward and I'm not sure if I can do this to him after what he's been through and because I think he's straight.”

Tom's left eyebrow joined the right one high on his forehead. 

Jesus, the guy was cute. If there wasn't a certain other, even cuter guy seared into Jensen's brain, he would've kissed him right about now.

“It's lame, I know,” he grumbled, shaking the thought off. “But I keep thinking that he deserved someone better than me, someone without so much baggage and without a kid in tow and who has his shit together. Someone like you.”

“Jensen-”

“I mean it, Tom. I like you, and it would be awesome if we could stay friends despite all this. I'm sorry for pretending that it could be more than that.” Jensen looked him straight in the eye as he apologized.

“It's okay. And my offer still stands. If you need a babysitter or a friend, give me a call,” Tom smiled warmly, although he didn't try to hide the sadness behind it. “Like, say, when you take Misha out on a date.”

“He's straight, for Christ's sake,” Jensen sighed. “And I don't think he's interested anyway.”

“The way he glares at me every time I meet him and dare so much as kiss you in front of him says differently,” Tom shrugged nonchalantly.

“So you think--?”

“Yeah, I think.”

That afternoon, Jensen hugged Tom goodbye, and the hug felt good and right for the first time – because this time, it was a platonic one.

***

"Jay?"

"Hey Mack."

"It's barely after lunch, I just walked out of a lecture. Is everything alright? Is AJ alright?"

"Yeah, he is. This is... this is not about him," Jensen said with a heavy sigh.

"Jay," Mack began sharply. "What did you do?"

"I broke up with Tom over lunch."

"That's... well, uh. How did he take it?"

Jensen huffed out a bitter laugh, even though he couldn't help but feel elated, too. "Like he already guessed it would happen? He wasn't mad."

"That's great to hear, but... why?"

"Why did I break up with him? Isn't that obvious?"

"No, I mean... why now? Why the change of heart?"

"Misha told me about a job offer he got from the Morning News. Foreign correspondent in Moscow."

"Did he accept it?"

"Not as far as I know, but he's thinking about it," Jensen sighed. "The point is, I gotta be honest, for my own sanity and because neither Tom nor Misha deserve to be treated like I treat them right now. I've been a hypocritical asshole and I can't live this double life any more. And if Misha is going to Moscow and I never told him how I feel, then I'll regret it forever."

"So you're going to tell him?"

"Yeah, I just don't know how right now, but I'll figure that out."

"What are you gonna do if he doesn't return your feelings?"

"Bite the bullet and get over it. At least, I've got some closure then."

"I'm just glad you're sorting out this mess, you know. When I gave you Tom's number, I thought it'd help you get over Misha, no matter if Tom is the one for you or not. I didn't mean for this chaos to happen. Just... one more question, Jay, because I gotta get back to my lecture. If you've got it all planned out, why are you telling me?"

"I... I dunno. Just wanted to share with you, I guess. Wanted to hear what you think."

For a short second, Mackenzie fell silent. But at her next words, the smile in her voice made Jensen smile, too. "I think you're doing the right thing for once. "

"Thanks, that's... that's what I wanted to hear," Jensen answered surprised.

"Good luck."

"Thank you."

"Don't thank me, it's not like you need it. But tell me what he said? Please?"

Jensen snorted, then ended the call. 

***

It took Jensen two weeks to get his plan and his courage together.

One week to decide that lunch without Tom was boring, while lunch with Tom was mildly awkward at first, when he almost kissed Jensen hello. In the end it was the more entertaining option, though. One Saturday where the excuse that Tom had other plans worked very good when Jensen needed to explain why he spent the night at home with Misha. Two weeks to confirm the fact that him and Tom were friends, and that they were good.

Misha and Jensen were friends, too, but they were everything but good. For two weeks, Jensen had the feeling that whenever Misha looked at him, he was pondering. The Damocles' Sword of Misha's possible move to Russia constantly loomed over their heads, and Jensen felt the weight on his shoulders more than he let on.

So when it was time to kick off The Big Reveal plan, Tom was the first person Jensen talked to.

“Alright, so what's the plan?” Tom smiled, clapping his hands.

“You're sure this is not way too much to ask two weeks after we broke up?” Jensen asked to reassure himself.

Tom just raised an eyebrow. “What are we, teenagers? Besides, as your friend, I really just want to see you happy. So, anyway I can help meddle, I will.”

“Not much meddling involved, actually,” Jensen shrugged, then took a sip from his coffee, “I wanted to ask you if you would mind babysitting on Saturday.”

With a smile, Tom said, “If you're sure that AJ and I will get along?”

“We'll see, but I think you will get along just fine. How about you come around on Saturday, say, 3 p.m.? That way, he'll have some time to get used to you while I'm still there.”

Tom nodded. “Alright. You still haven't answered my question, though. The plan?”

“Nothing fancy,” Jensen huffed, but couldn't help to start feeling excited. “Just dinner and a good old-fashioned talk.”

“And there I expected a hotel suite and rose petals on the bed,” Tom teased with a wide grin.

“Ha-ha. Actually, I already saw that happening. In the latest chick-flick you watched,” Jensen threw back.

“It's a guilty pleasure!” Tom defended himself with an embarrassed grin.

“Guilty pleasure my ass,” Jensen answered without venom, and they both started laughing.

“By the way, will you ask him out or is it going to be a surprise?”

“Complete surprise, of course.”

_Phase A of The Big Reveal Plan effectively set into motion,_ Jensen thought.

***

When Tom showed up on Saturday, AJ was crying loudly in Jensen's arms.

“You're already meeting him at his best,” Jensen said, his voice raised over the sound of AJ wailing out his anguish about fresh diapers. Or something.

“Let me hold him?” Tom offered, and Jensen handed AJ over with a sigh. Instinctively, AJ reached around Tom's neck and held on.

“Hey, there, little one,” Tom looked down at the baby in his arms, smiling widely, and Jensen felt how a grin split his lips.

“What?” Tom asked, having noted Jensen's look from the corner of his eyes.

“Nothing. Just, the kid's a good look on you.”

“A-ha,” Tom huffed suspiciously.

Jensen rolled his eyes and walked past him into the living room.

AJ got increasingly calm the more Jensen walked through the apartment and showed Tom around – where AJ's play set was, which parts he absolutely shouldn't let AJ crawl around in, where the pulp to heat up for dinner was. It was a lot to tell and a lot to take care of, but Tom nodded attentively at everything Jensen told him.

Jensen, on the other hand, realized now more than ever to which incredible amount he had taken Misha for granted, had accepted how Misha knew his way around the apartment and seemed to tend to the exact need AJ was complaining about at the time.

“It'll be weird, leaving him alone with me, huh?” Tom asked when they sat down on the couch. By now, AJ had fallen asleep on Tom's broad, muscled chest that Jensen still had his separate chapter of feelings for, but it didn't nearly tug at his heartstrings the way it did when AJ slept on Misha's chest. It only made him think of words like 'adorable' and 'cute', and didn't make him feel like he wanted to rip his heart out, lay it bare and give Misha the choice to take it or leave it.

“Yeah, but it'll be alright,” Jensen smiled.

The time until 7 p.m. flew by way too fast. AJ warmed up to Tom quickly, and when he wasn't asleep, he played with Tom without a fuss, even when Jensen left the room.

When the doorbell rang for the second time that day, Jensen didn't even think about what it had to look like with Tom standing behind him, AJ perched against his hip.

Misha's face fell so quick that Jensen barely caught the smile that had been there before.

“I see you're smack in the middle of preparing for the time when I'm gone,” he commented dryly.

“What?” Jensen frowned. “First, hello to you too, and second, Tom's just babysitting tonight.”

“Guess it was time that your boyfriend met your foster son anyway. Alright, I'll be out of your hair,” and with that, Misha turned on his heels and headed towards his apartment.

“Misha, no! Wait, you're-” Jensen looked back at Tom to wait for his nod of 'I got AJ, don't worry', then followed Misha across the hall, only to have Misha's apartment door slam in his face. “You've got this all wrong!” he clarified to the polished wood.

“Not much to get wrong about this,” Misha snapped from behind the door.

“Yes, there is. Tom's not my--”

“Save it, I'm not listening. Now if you excuse me, I have a phone call to make to the Morning News. They'll be glad to hear about the addition of their new foreign correspondent.”

“Misha!” Jensen shouted, but this time, there wasn't an answer.

After a few presses of the doorbell, Misha yelled back, “Cut it out!”

“No! Not like this! Misha, please let me talk to you!”

“About how Tom's replaced me in pretty much everything, except, right, that's totally not what it looks like? Sorry, Jensen, this time you've pushed too far.”

Jensen frowned to himself, wondering what exactly Misha meant but not having time to dwell on it. “Just... let me in, please. Let me explain,” he begged.

Finally, the door opened and Misha peaked out with a frown. “Five minutes,” he informed Jensen sternly.

Jensen nodded and took a deep breath. “For starters, Tom's not my boyfriend anymore. We broke up two weeks ago.”

“And you didn't tell me?”

“I kinda... didn't know how to say it,” Jensen mumbled, feeling silly now that it had come out in a rush.

“You are unbelievable,” Misha snorted, shaking his head.

“I broke up with him because I needed to be honest about this and because I needed to get my priorities straight.”

“That's specific,” Misha snarked with a healthy dose of sarcasm.

“Listen, can I just come in?” Jensen pleaded with a glance at the staircase. There was no need to have this conversation with the neighbors listening.

After a silent staring match of a few long moments, Misha opened the door wide and let Jensen in. “So, I guess there's more?”

“Yeah, there's more. I don't even know where to start,” Jensen sighed frustratedly.

Misha shot back immediately, “Start at the part where I feel like I don't even know where I am in your life or what I'm even doing there. One day you're acting like... I don't know, like we live together and everything is domestic bliss and the next day, you're distant and you're going out on dates and you come back home with... Anyway, what the hell is your problem, Jensen?”

“My problem is that ever since Josh's accident, I've had a really hard time trusting people and letting them into my life. And then you show up and waltz into my life like it's just that easy, and you're this awesome, funny guy and I'm starting to like you, like, really fucking much and then you're leaving! To move to fucking Russia!”

Misha spluttered. “I'm sorry, do you think I planned all this? The whole moving to Dallas and falling for my neighbor and his adorable kid? Plus, I don't think I owe you anything, or did I miss the fine print?”

“No, of course you don't owe me anything! That's not what I mean! Wait-”

“Then what do you mean?” Misha yelled, arms raised and opened wide, a frown of confusion knitting his brows. “By any means, enlighten me!”

“Did you just say you fell for me?” Jensen asked in disbelief.

Misha's mouth opened and closed like a fish's a couple times. It didn't look like he had a good answer or would find one any time soon.

Instead of chasing the issue, Jensen shook it off and picked up the question from before. “I meant that I need you, Misha. I need you here, with me. And AJ needs you, don't you see that?” he said softly, pleading Misha to respond.

Jensen saw something like hope flare up in Misha's eyes, but it quickly dimmed as Misha's face crumbled into a grimace. “If you need a babysitter, you obviously have Tom. I don't see the issue here. And since we're already at the topic, you didn't have a hard time trusting Tom and letting him into your life, either.”

“Yeah, well, Tom was safe ground as far as just my life was concerned, but in case you didn't notice, he didn't even get to the part where he could really hurt me – meaning, he only met AJ today, after we broke up,” Jensen sighed exhausted. “I want you in my life, Misha, and I want you in AJ's life. But _not as his babysitter_.”

“Then what?” Misha asked, almost breathless.

Jensen would burst out laughing if his heart wasn’t killing him right now and he'd felt like he’d rather jump out of the window than say any of this. “Look, I know you're straight-”

From the corner of his eyes, Jensen noticed that Misha opened his mouth to throw in a comment, but Jensen waved him off.

“This sure as hell isn't how I planned to say it, but please, just, let me say this, alright?” Jensen waited for Misha's nod before he continued, eyes firmly fixed on Misha. “I know you're straight, but if you're going to Russia and this is my only chance to say this, then you deserve to hear it. It's been almost a year now since we met and I've been in love with you for most of it, okay? Sorry for dropping this bomb on you all of a sudden, but um – well.”

Misha blinked a few times, regarded Jensen carefully. “Most of it?”

“If that's your take-away, sure, yes,” Jensen huffed out a breathy chuckle, glad that it was finally said and out there. “I mean, I'm a stubborn bastard on the best of days, I know that, so it took me a while to realize. At first I thought it was just because you were so good at handling AJ and because I was a wreck anyway and then I thought I shouldn't feel like this because it's only gonna end badly and I don't want to drag anybody down with me. And there's still AJ, and I can't just let people into my life like that because that's also his life and we're kind of a package deal, but I guess since it's been so easy with you, it was kind of a sign. Sorry, I'm rambling.”

“You are,” Misha said with a bright smile on his face that had been building constantly all throughout Jensen's little speech.

“My point is, it's gonna be hard to see you go to Russia, but you're right. You don't owe me anything and I knew this wouldn't be happening, especially since how I treated you, so. I'm just glad I got it off my chest,” Jensen sighed again, but couldn't prevent the sadness from working its way into his tone. “I'm sorry.”

Misha still smiled, which was odd.

“What?” Jensen asked, slumping against the kitchen counter behind him, bracing himself for the inevitable. Meaning, being let down easy by Misha just like he had been let down easy by Tom.

“You know how when AJ was just a few weeks old and everyone thought he was a girl, just because you dressed him in pink onesies?” Misha squinted at him from a few feet away.

Confused, Jensen shook his head. “Yeah?”

“Everyone jumped to conclusions, just because they wouldn't think out of the box, because they thought a boy can't wear pink, too.”

“What's your point?”

Misha stepped forward, arms held out invitingly. His eyes were soft, the smile on his lips fond as he tilted his head. “Jay, just because I was married to a woman doesn't mean that I'm straight.”

Jensen swallowed heavily at the implication. He wanted to hope, even though he almost didn't dare to.

“In fact, I'm anything but,” Misha clarified as he took another step towards Jensen, invading his bubble of personal space just like he had done for months.

Only this time, Jensen felt the air prickle between them. It felt like every inch that vanished between them created sparks that hit his skin and made it shiver. His heart was pumping too fast – again – and Jensen took a deep breath when Misha lifted his hand to cradle his cheek in it, caressing the stubble with his thumb. Jensen relaxed and leaned into the touch, unable to look away from Misha's deep blue eyes that shone with so much compassion.

The blow had to come any second now, the big But that Jensen was afraid of.

_I'm not straight, but you're just a friend._   
_I'm not straight, but you have a kid and I can't do that._   
_I'm not straight, and I really like you, but I'm still going to Russia._

Jensen let his eyes flutter shut, because he reached the point where he couldn't bear it any more. He felt Misha shifting on his feet because his palm suddenly clutched his cheek harder before returning to the gentle hold it had on him before.

And then there were lips pressed onto his own, just a short, affectionate peck.

Jensen's eyes flew open immediately, to find Misha right there, a smirk curling the edges of his mouth. He was speechless and not ashamed to admit it.

“Wanted to do this for a while now,” Misha whispered, right against Jensen's sensitive lips.

Jensen could only take so much. Without any further ado, he wrapped his arms around Misha's waist and pulled him flush against his body. One of Misha's legs landed in-between Jensen's as he balanced out the sudden shift in gravity, but Jensen didn't mind. He just wanted Misha as close as possible, for as long as possible.

His chin rested on Misha's shoulder when Jensen said pleadingly, “Please tell me this isn't _all_ you wanted. Because I can't--”

Misha's chuckle interrupted him, accompanied by a shy kiss placed onto his neck, right below his ear. “Nah, that's far from all.”

Jensen pulled back a bit, just so he could look at Misha's face. His right hand ran up Misha's back so he could thread his fingers through the short hair on the back of Misha's head. Jesus, they were so close, Jensen could lean in and kiss him any time he wanted. And he knew he was staring at Misha's lips, but damn, it was hard not to.

“Are you gonna kiss me sometime this year or...?” Misha asked smugly, his sparkling eyes almost making Jensen give up his last resistance.

“Only if you're not going to Russia. I mean, I can't do this if you... I can't lose you,” Jensen said, his voice breaking mid-sentence. “Sorry, don't get me wrong, this is not an ultimatum, and I don't want to force you to do anything, I know that it's your choice and if you want to go, I can't stop you and I'll totally understand, but then we can't-”

“You're rambling again,” Misha reminded him amused. “And no, I haven't signed the contract yet. It's still laying on my coffee table, because I couldn't bring myself to leave you. So, no. I won't sign, I won't go. I didn't want to in the first place, to be completely honest. And what I didn't tell you was that they offered me a job as a reporter, too, no matter if I'd go to Russia or not.”

“Thank God,” Jensen just groaned before leaning in and capturing Misha's lips with his own, locking them in a desperate, probably too hard and too wet kiss. Jensen didn't really care, his brain was still too occupied with having Misha, having him for real this time, with being able to kiss him at all and – Misha seemed about as grateful and as happy as Jensen himself. He grinned into their kiss, which gave Jensen the opportunity to slip his tongue between his teeth, playing gently with Misha's, before Misha sucked the tip between his lips, which made Jensen groan into his mouth in return.

It was their first kiss and it was already so dirty.

Jensen leaned back when his oxygen supply definitely reached critical status and he couldn't help but grin like the Cheshire cat.

That's when they heard a harsh cry from across the hall and both sighed, then laughed.

“I guess someone needs our attention,” Jensen smiled. Suddenly, a thought hit him like a train wreck, and he stuttered, “Are you sure about this? I mean, AJ and I...”

“Of course I am, dummy,” Misha clicked his tongue in disapproval. “Don't you think that hasn't been going through my head for months now? I love that kid. I'd be grateful to see him grow up with you as his dad. I'm glad you are a package deal.”

Warmth flooded Jensen's chest at Misha's quick lecture. He couldn't help but mumble bashfully, “I said I didn't want you as AJ's babysitter. I hope you know that I meant I want you as AJ's other dad.”

“I got that by now, you know,” Misha replied, not without a warm grin in return, “and that's why I'm gonna go check on _our son_ now, since he's still crying.”

“Don't you trust Tom to handle it?”

Misha shrugged. “Honestly, now that there's an us, I just really want to have all the members of said us together.”

With that, Misha worked his way out of Jensen's arms and left the kitchen with a pointed look and a smirk over his shoulder. When he came back, it was with AJ curled against his neck, eyes red and swollen from crying, and his thumb between his teeth, his other arm thrown around Misha's neck.

He was already calm again, just from resting his head on Misha's shoulder.

And Jensen thought that it had been a wonder his heart hadn't burst at Misha saying 'our son', but then it almost did the same thing again at seeing the picture in front of him.

“So, are we still up for dinner tonight?” Misha asked.

“Yeah, of course,” Jensen rasped, then wrapped his arms around his two favorite boys.

***

“Is he asleep?” Misha whispered when Jensen slipped under the covers that night.

“He's out like a light. Too much excitement and new people today,” Jensen grinned, then reached over to pull Misha into his arms.

It was an invitation that Misha obviously didn't need to hear twice. Instead of letting Jensen pull him close, he rolled on top of him, his lips locking immediately with Jensen's in a hungry, devouring kiss.

“Hi,” Misha mumbled around a smirk when he leaned back.

“Hey,” Jensen sighed on the exhale, “What was that for?”

“Oh, just, something I've been wanting to do for weeks,” Misha nibbled along Jensen's bottom lip, his tongue sneaking out and placing quick licks across Jensen's lips and teeth every so often, too short and fast to follow them with his own tongue.

Misha was playing, teasing, testing the waters, and Jensen enjoyed every second of it. Instinctively Jensen rolled his hips up into Misha's thigh, letting him feel just how much of the waters Misha didn't need to test any more.

“Don't you wanna take it slow or something?” Jensen asked to make sure.

“Jay, we've been taking it slow for almost a year now,” Misha accentuated his statement with a blissful sigh and a downward roll of his hips, his cotton-clad cock rubbing hard against Jensen's thigh in return.

Jensen couldn't help but moan helplessly. If he thought the feeling of being wanted by someone was exhilarating, then this – feeling wanted and actually wanting the one he was with – was a Kingda Ka stratocoaster ride. He hadn't felt like this for way too long.

Suddenly, Misha halted in his moves and pulled away to watch Jensen carefully.

“Except, if you'd want to--”

“Oh, hell no,” Jensen groaned, then dug his heels into the mattress to gain leverage and flip them both over. The shift in position allowed Jensen to place his thigh in-between Misha's legs and with a tilt of his hips, have their still-clothed dicks rub against each other's. “I've wanted you since the day I met you, so don't even try to pull this one on me.”

Misha laughed huskily. “Right back at you.”

“God,” Jensen moaned, both at the delicious friction building up between them as they fell into a rhythm, and at the realization. “We've been so stupid, haven't we? We wasted so much time.”

Misha met his hips at every downward thrust, held him steady with one hand at the small of his back, guiding his every move, and the other ran up his back until he had his fingers fisted in the short hair on the back of Jensen's head. “You have no idea,” Misha chuckled.

“Time to make up for lost opportunities?” Jensen offered with a smirk while pushing Misha down with his entire weight.

With a long, unabashed groan, Misha pushed at Jensen's hips. “Stop, stop right there,” he begged.

“What is it? Did I hurt you?” Jensen asked worriedly, immediately shifting his weight back onto his hands and feet instead of Misha's body.

Misha shook his head, obviously amused, as he tried to catch his breath. “Nah, you just... almost made me come in my pants like a college boy. I'm sorry, I'm just a bit... out of the loop, I guess.”

“Yeah, that would make two of us,” Jensen shot back with a hooded glance at Misha. “C'mon, there's too many clothes between us.”

After rolling off the bed and onto his feet, Jensen grabbed Misha's hand and helped him up. They both had a visible bulge in their boxers, which would have been embarrassing were it anyone else but Misha standing in front of him. Jensen only looked for a quick second, then slipped his hands under Misha's t-shirt, let them run over warm, smooth skin and already erected nipples, to ruck it up to Misha's shoulders.

Although he had known what Misha looked like underneath, the sight of him after Jensen got rid of his shirt still slayed him. “Jeez, you're gorgeous. Never got to tell you that.”

Misha raised an eyebrow, then peeked playfully under Jensen's shirt. “Something tells me you're not too bad, either.”

Jensen shrugged and helped Misha pull the shirt over his head, all the while trying to maintain as much skin-to-skin contact as possible. Their boxers were next, Misha's first, to reveal a dick that wasn't far from how Jensen had envisioned it, shorter and thicker than his own, but with a slight, natural bend to the left and a head that made Jensen lick his lips in anticipation. While he was still staring, Misha worked his hands down the back of Jensen's boxer briefs, pulling the fabric down over the swell of his ass while still managing to grope him. 

And then Misha stared, just like Jensen had, but when he looked back up, Jensen found his deep blue eyes sparkling with lust and desire. Without further hesitation, Misha shoved their hips together and wrapped his hand around both their cocks, stroking from head to base and back while they exchanged another breathtaking kiss.

This time, it was Jensen who stopped him by gripping his wrist. “Not like this,” he begged. “Please, not like this.”

“Then how do you want it?” Misha smiled, his eyelids dropping to half-mast.

“With your cock in my ass,” Jensen grinned against Misha's lips when he noticed the hitch in Misha's breath.

“Language,” Misha scolded playfully. “But I'll be so kind as to take your wish into consideration.”

“You better, you still owe me one for interrupting some me-time not too long ago.”

“I did what?”

“You brought me coffee when I was right in the middle of my first jerk-off session after, you know, AJ happened?” Jensen winked.

Misha's brows knitted together to a frown as he pondered. “Wait... that morning you answered the door wearing only a pair of jeans and a massive boner?”

Jensen felt heat spreading on his face. “Yeah, that one.”

To Jensen's surprise, Misha leaned in to kiss him desperately, ravishing his mouth and biting down on his bottom lip before pulling back. “You know what I did that day after I went to my apartment?” he groaned heavily, his lips barely inches away from Jensen's. “I sat down on the floor behind the door and masturbated to the thought of you, doing the same across the hall, because I didn't even make it to the bedroom or the shower. Wanted to go over there and have you so badly.”

“Oh,” Jensen answered intelligently at the mental picture. “Me too. I mean. I wanted you, too, and I sat behind the door jerking off while thinking of you, too.”

The next thing Jensen knew, he was shoved onto the bed on all fours.

“Bedside table?” Misha panted breathlessly.

“Yeah, top drawer,” Jensen confirmed with a nod, resting his forehead on his arms.

Misha hummed, and the click of the bottle of lube was all Jensen needed to hear. He spread his legs willingly, giving Misha the perfect view of his ass, even wriggling it a bit.

“I really like the sight of that,” Misha praised and slapped one hand down lightly on Jensen's ass cheek. 

Then there was the cold touch of lubed fingers at his entrance, and Jensen willed himself to relax, to accept the intrusion when it came, and from there, it was easy. He'd done this often enough, just, with less feelings involved.

Turned out, the feelings only made sex better.

“C'mon, another,” Jensen pleaded after what seemed like an hour of being fingered by Misha's index finger only.

“Bossy bottom, I like that,” Misha chuckled.

What followed was the nudge of a second finger at the rim, and it slipped in just as easily. Misha reached in deep and curled his fingers, and Jensen knew what he was looking for. 

Yet, he wasn't prepared for the wave of overwhelming need and want that washed over him the second Misha found his prostate. Jensen wallowed in it, cherished it, let it take over his body and rolled with the delicious feeling while gasping for air.

He almost let go then, almost allowed himself to come, but managed to catch himself at the very last moment. It was a close call, though, and he only had Misha's two fingers in his ass.

“God, you take it so good, Jay. One of these days, I wanna spend a day doing nothing but this until you've come three times at least,” Misha groaned, hot puffs of air hitting the sensitive skin of Jensen's ass. “But today is not that day.”

There was the disappointing loss of Misha's fingers, but Jensen noted the ripping of plastic that made him even more excited for what was to come. A few, countless moments later, Jensen felt Misha's hands on his hips, guiding him backwards until the blunt head of Misha's cock nudged first against his entrance, rubbed over the stretched muscle, and then slipped in. Jensen took the opportunity to push back, knowing that he would be able to take it, would be able to take Misha in one go like this, and when Misha bottomed out, Jensen felt like his muscles and bones had liquefied.

“Fuck, I missed this so much,” he moaned, listening to Misha's hard breaths.

“Me too.”

The first thrust was slow and easy, careful and loving and made Jensen relax immediately.

“Do you like it like this?” Misha asked.

“Yeah, but don't think I don't like it harder some time down the road.”

Misha groaned again and shoved his dick into Jensen, one, two, three quick thrust, to prove a point - but then sighed and held still. “No, not like this. Bad idea.”

Jensen laughed breathlessly.

“No, don't you make fun of me. I've dreamed of this moment for months, I won't let it slip by just like this.”

“Yeah, I get it. Me too.”

His thrusts were slow and measured as he pushed Jensen forward until he was spread out flat on the bed in front of him. Misha covered Jensen's body completely with his and fucked him gently, managed to hit Jensen's prostate repeatedly until he was a begging, moaning mess, writhing on Misha's dick.

“Jay,” he whispered tenderly into Jensen's neck, making him shiver.

“Yeah?”

“I hate to bring this up, but I'm not gonna last too long like this,” Misha sighed.

Jensen chuckled, then turned his head so he could kiss Misha over his shoulder. “Aw,” he teased. “But I think I have an idea what we could do about that.”

Misha paused his shallow thrusts and took a few deep breaths. “And that would be...?”

“Lay down on your back,” Jensen instructed.

Misha slipped out of Jensen to do as he was told, and Jensen followed quickly, straddling his hips and immediately sliding down on his cock again.

“Mh,” he hummed appreciatively when he sat flat on Misha's lap, simply enjoying the feeling of being full for a few moments.

And Misha just looked speechlessly up at him, his plush lips slightly parted, his blue eyes half closed. “Oh, fuck. Did you just-”

“I did,” Jensen grinned, then started to move. Gentle thrusts, careful at first, while Misha's hands scrambled for purchase on his hips, holding Jensen in place to roll his hips up against him.

“God, that's good,” Misha panted. “And I'm so out of practice.”

With a flick of his thumb and index finger, Jensen rolled Misha's nipple between his fingers and watched delightedly as he arched his back into the touch. “Doesn't matter.”

“But I'm so close again,” Misha whined, the rhythm of their hips now perfectly attuned to each other's.

“Then come,” Jensen smiled.

Misha shot him a disbelieving glance, but his hips started to stutter.

With a smirk, Jensen leaned down over him and whispered roughly into his ear, “Come for me, Mish.”

On the next thrust, Misha bucked up into him and came with a few shuddering groans, his hands clutching Jensen's back and shoulders.

“Didn't want it to be like this,” he mumbled when he opened his eyes afterwards, still breathless. “'s not perfect.”

“It's as perfect as we want it to be,” Jensen answered. “Can you last a bit longer?”

Without waiting for Misha's response, Jensen sat up straight and rocked himself gently on Misha's still hard dick, the tip stimulating his prostate perfectly. Just a bit more of this and he would follow right after Misha.

His concentration was screwed when he felt Misha's hand wrap around his own cock, starting to stroke him in time with his moves.

“That's so unfair, you know,” Misha commented, his voice deep and dark and still shot to hell. At this point, he could've read the phone book to Jensen and he would've jizzed his pants. “I just came and I'm so oversensitive right now and there – ah, fuck – you are taking advantage of me.”

Jensen just hummed as Misha canted his hips just right for the perfect angle, felt the buzz in his lower abdomen curl into what he knew would be one hell of a release.

“Hate to sound like a clichee, Jay, but you're so damn tight. If I could, I'd just come up your ass a second time,” Misha sighed.

Which was what finally tipped Jensen over the edge, and he came all over Misha's stomach and hand, his orgasm punching the air right out of him. Jensen felt how his knees still shook even after the waves of satisfaction rolling through his body had ceased, and his stomach curled into that delicious twist that only an earth-shattering climax left. He slumped down and grinned into Misha's shoulder.

“Love you so much,” Misha added and bumped his head against Jensen's affectionately.

“Love you, too,” Jensen answered with a wide smile, running his hands through Misha's sweaty strands of hair.

“Now get off of me,” Misha grumbled. “I've got clean-up to do.”

Jensen kissed him and laughed.

***

AJ spoke his first word on a Sunday morning, when he was one year and barely a month old.

Jensen had taken him out of his crib and to their bed. After crying for two hours, AJ would calm down sooner and probably sleep another hour or two when he was with them.

Jensen watched amused as AJ crawled to the middle of the mattress and threw an insulted look at Misha, who dared to still be asleep. With a nudge of his tiny hand against Misha's chest, AJ tried to wake him, but to no avail. Misha just snorted in his sleep and wrinkled his nose.

“Papa,” Jensen suddenly heard and thought he was hallucinating. But then, AJ's hand nudged Misha again, accompanied by a louder, “Papa!”

With rapidly blinking eyes, Misha looked up at AJ and a speechless Jensen.

“Papa!”

“I guess someone's talking to you,” Jensen smiled and tried to be the better man here.

At the sound of his voice, AJ whipped his head around, then reached up with both arms towards Jensen. “Daaa!”

Jensen raised an eyebrow as a wave of excitement and affection hit him hard. Damn, his kid was cute. “If that was supposed to be a 'daddy', then we really need to work on that,” he mused as he returned to bed, two sets of eyes following him.

“Daa,” AJ said again, and it still didn't sound like babbling.

“Daddy,” Jensen corrected.

“Dada?” AJ tried again.

“Daddy,” Jensen smiled.

“Da- daday.”

“I'll take that as a daddy,” Jensen grinned, then picked AJ up to cuddle him.

It worked until AJ twisted around in his arms to look at Misha, reaching out to him.

“Papa.”

“Daddy and papa, I like the sound of that,” Misha said before he took AJ from Jensen's arms and they settled on the bed with AJ between them.


	9. Epilogue

"Andy!"

"Leave me alone, dad!"

"Andrew Joshua Ackles, you get your butt down here _right now_!" Jensen yells up the stairs of their house.

Misha appears in the doorway to the kitchen with a towel in his hands and a frown knitting his brows. "What's up?"

Jensen rolls his eyes and shrugs helplessly, "No idea. I told him to go clean up his room and he just flipped. I guess something's up, he's been cranky for days."

"Alright," Misha nods and puts the towel on the hook beside the door frame. "Let me talk to him."

When Misha walks past him, Jensen notes another strike of white on Misha's temple, and catches himself at the thought that salt'n'pepper hair looks damn fine on his husband.

"Good luck with that," Jensen huffs, but he follows Misha upstairs anyway. He gropes his ass, but that's more playful habit, considering their situation, and Misha slaps his hand away with an amused huff.

After Misha gains a few steps ahead of him, Jensen falls back and lets him enter Andy's room alone. Misha has always been better at handling the feelings talks, somehow.

"Hey," he hears Misha say. "AJ, what's up?"

"AJ is a chubby six-year-old. Stop calling me that."

"Okay, Andy, what's up? You know exactly that this is no way to talk to us."

"Nothing's up."

"Oh, please. Try that again with someone who doesn't know you the way your dad and I do."

For a moment, there's silence, and the rustle of the sheets tells Jensen that they both sat down on the bed. Jensen decides now is the right time to enter the scene, too, so he peeks around the open door into Andy's room. "You know you can tell us if there's anything bothering you. Or anyone," he offers.

"I know. But this is... you wouldn't understand," Andy sighs heavily, hunching in on himself and looking like misery personified.

"Dunno about your pops, but I've been 16 once, too. Try me," Jensen offers and crouches down in front of his son, looking up at him expectantly.

Andy scratches the back of his neck with one hand, a move that he's clearly picked up from Jensen. Misha's eyes always get those fond crinkles when he notices it, and Jensen always notices when Misha notices.

"I met someone at school,” Andy finally mumbles.

"Well, that's great!" Jensen smiles encouragingly. "Why don't you tell us a bit about him or her?" 

Even though they raised Andy to have an open mind and with the promise that they would always love him no matter what, Andy hesitates. Jensen can't explain it.

"Because..." Andy starts and suddenly raises his voice, panicked. "Because you're having freakishly loud gay sex, like, every night, and I hear it through the walls and that's... I don't want to hear that, dad!"

Jensen coughs and shifts his weight uncomfortably on his feet. "Well, uh... I'm sorry that you heard that," he mumbles and glares accusingly at Misha, who shrugs casually, but smirks. _Bastard,_ Jensen thinks fondly, now that he remembers yesterday night. No wonder Andy picked _that_ up. Then he clears his throat and follows up with, "But what does it have to do with that person?"

Andy shakes his head. "It's... She's a girl, you know.” He looks at them slowly, first at Misha, then at Jensen, and announces, “Dad, pops, I'm straight."

"And?" Misha prompts. "That doesn't get you out of having to tidy up your room."

"I know. And I'm sorry I yelled at you for that, dad," Andy says meekly towards Jensen.

"Apology accepted," Jensen nods with a placating smile. "As long as you do clean your room later and explain to me why you thought we wouldn't understand?"

"I just thought because you're both gay and... I mean, that's obviously normal and all, but you've been with each other for what, 14 years now?"

"15," Misha corrects.

"So, it's like... isn't it weird for you?"

Misha frowns, clearly confused. "What, having a straight son?"

"Yeah?"

"Because only straight parents raise straight kids and gay parents raise gay kids?" Jensen throws in, amused.

At that, Andy chuckles. "Okay, you got me there."

“Look, it doesn't need to be weird. Just... if you want to talk about girls, you better ask Misha. That's not really my subject."

Andy perks up. "So you're gay, but pops...?"

"I was married for years before I met your dad. To a woman," Misha explains with a wink.

"Huh. You never told me that."

"You never had a sexuality crisis before, kid," Misha huffs, patting Andy's back in support.

"Glad we got that out the way," Jensen says quickly at that. "I'll leave you two to it. I'm outta here."

"Hey!" Andy and Misha protest at the same time, and Jensen remembers why he hates and loves them both.

"You stay right where you are, I'm not doing The Talk alone," Misha complains.

"I don't wanna have it at all!" Andy grumbles.

"Oh, and before you sit, go get a condom from the bedroom?"

" _Pops!_ "

"What? It's part of The Talk, and a part I know for sure Jensen can teach you."

"Oh god," Andy groans. "I did not want to know that. Please stop psychologically scarring me forever."

Jensen feels a smirk work its way onto his lips. "Believe me, that's got nothing to say about who tops and who bottoms."

" _Dad!_ "

"Alright, alright," Jensen laughs, then leaves for the bedroom.

When he returns, he finds an uncomfortable looking Andy staring at the floor with Misha's arm around his back. 

Misha mouths a silent 'Thanks, I love you' over Andy's head.

Jensen simply gives him his 'Hey, big boy' wink and blows him a kiss, and watches delighted when Misha folds with laughter.

"You two are disgusting," Andy deadpans with a tone that shows he's learned the snarking from the best. Namely, Misha.

"Parents always are," Jensen smiles. 

**THE END**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Again, a big Thank You to my wonderful beta, [winjennster](http://winjennster.livejournal.com/)! (Pst, you should totally go follow her on [tumblr](http://winjennster.tumblr.com/). She also writes totally awesome fanfics, check them out [here](http://archiveofourown.org/users/WinJennster/pseuds/WinJennster)!)  
> If you want to follow me, here's [my tumblr](http://howtumblrruinedmylife.tumblr.com/).
> 
> I'll post another Jensen/Misha story, which is a submission to this year's [spn_reversebang](http://spn_reversebang.livejournal.com/), on January 17th. If you're interested, [here's a teaser](http://howtumblrruinedmylife.tumblr.com/post/71544368042).
> 
> Thank you all for reading! If you want to make me happy, leave a comment or an [ask on tumblr](http://howtumblrruinedmylife.tumblr.com/ask) :)


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